


The light has always been there

by allthatis_gold



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Divergence but also not, F/F, F/M, Fix-It of Sorts, I Will Go Down With This Ship, I wasn't happy with The Rise Of Skywalker so there, I'm Bad At Summaries, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, cameos galore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:35:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 19
Words: 43,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26718373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allthatis_gold/pseuds/allthatis_gold
Summary: When a mysterious broadcast is sent from the Unknown Regions, the Resistance and the First Order are both confused as to what is going on; for the message comes in the voice of the late Emperor Palpatine. Who threatens revenge on those who dare oppose the true ruler of the galaxy.As destruction and chaos loom in the air with the silence of the First Order, the Resistance is in a race against time to stop whatever threat could be lurking from within the Unknown Regions.But not everything is at is appears to be.
Relationships: Finn/Rose Tico, Poe Dameron/Finn, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 29
Kudos: 75





	1. The dead speak!

There was no movement in the forest.

In the midst of the trees, a single person sat upon a fallen tree. A few drops of morning dew crowning their hair and eyelashes.

“Be with me.” Rey whispered, hot air exhaling out of her nose and parted mouth as she continued to control her breathing. “Be with me.” She repeated, her fingers twitching in anticipation from where they rested on her knees. _Clear your mind and open your heart_ , Leia had said. Easier said than done, of course. Pebbles and small boulders hovered around her; Rey hadn't noticed of course, her eyes were closed in concentration. “Be with…” Her hazel eyes snapped open, the small orbit of rocks falling to the foliage with an audible ‘thump’. “They’re not with me.” She groaned.

BB-8 who had accompanied her outside since before the sun had risen, let out a long series of beeps.

“Yeah I thought it was a long shot too.” Rey sighed. BB-8 whined his response. “I don’t think that’s how it works Bee-Bee.” She laughed.

“Luke would say patience is the most important virtue for a Jedi.” Came the voice of Leia, who was making her way towards Rey. Always dressed fabulously, the older woman did not disappoint in her sky-blue fur trimmed coat that stuck out like a sore thumb amidst the thick green forests of Kashyyk around her and Rey’s drab dove grey attire.

“Well, Luke can stuff it.” Rey grumbled under her breath.

“I heard that.”

“I’m doing everything the texts instruct me to do. And it isn’t working.” Rey huffs, frustrated at herself. She had been trying to accomplish the task for a long time. “Maybe I’m just distracted.” Rey knew what the people in the Resistance whispered about her poor attempts of being a Jedi. She didn’t want to admit that she was failing. But she kind of was. And if anyone could see it really wasn’t her fault? There were only two people in the galaxy who could teach her, one was definitely out of the question considering who his alliances lied with and the other, although kind and helpful, was not a Jedi Master.

“Patience,” Leia insisted with that warm smile of hers that always made Rey’s heart twang a bit.That smile was how she had always dreamed her mother would smile at her. “When your heart is ready, you’ll be able to hear those who have come before.”

“I’m starting to think it’s impossible.” Rey monotoned, striding towards Leia so they were now face to face. It always struck her as odd how such a legendary hero could be so small.

The older woman’s eyes were bright and knowing. “If it were,” Leia sighed, linking their arms together so they could walk back to base. “I wouldn’t hear my brother’s nagging all the time, would I?” She jested with a sly smile.

“But you’re his _twin_ , General” Rey pointed out. “I’m assuming that has got to give you a head start.”

Leia shrugged, turning to look at the foliage and the tallest trees anyone would see in their lifetime that surrounded them. Rey took advantage of Leia’s attention being on the greenery to study the General as she so often did.

Her hair was always up and away from her face, the simple Alderaanian mourning braid a staple no matter her hairstyle. Today it was a circlet of braids. Jewelry always dangled from her earlobes (to which Rey couldn’t fathom why anyone would pierce their ears willingly) wrapped her wrists and fingers. In quiet moments like these, Rey found similarities between Ben and his parents. They both dressed like they wanted everybody in the room to notice them. Although they didn’t need to, their presence alone was radiant like a sun.

“You’re thinking too loudly.” Leia pointed out softly, the familiar trail coming into view.

“Sorry.” Rey murmured her cheeks blazing with embarrassment.

“It’s alright.” Leia assured her. “I can’t actually hear your thoughts. I could only do that with Luke…and Ben.” She added quietly after a moment. They never spoke about him. And Leia never uttered the name Kylo Ren. It was always the Supreme Leader or simply ‘him’. As if the man who terrorized the galaxy and the boy she birthed weren’t one and the same.

“Rey!” Finn trotted over to meet them half way. “They’re serving breakfast.” He breathed. Rey’s stomach grumbling at the thought of food. “Poe’s saved us a spot in the line!”

Rey turned to look at General Leia –who’s movements had started to slow since doctor Kalonia discharged her from rehabilitation after her stint in space thanks to the First Order. “It’s alright, Rey.” Leia smiled. “You go on ahead.” Rey beamed at her Master and let go of her arm; she walked up to Finn so they could hurry to the mess hall together.

Leia watched the young woman go with a fond smile on her face. She took a deep breath, the crisp morning air filling her lungs pleasantly. Leia extended a hand and let her fingers trail through the ferns. Hiding on Kashyyk was brilliant on her part. It was almost like hiding in plain sight. The Resistance had no noticeable allies here and it would take them months if not years to find them within the dense forests. Besides, Ben wouldn’t set foot in this place. The ghosts of days gone by that dwelled here wouldn’t let him.

Next to her right leg, BB-8 beeped a question at her.

“Of course I’d like an escort back to the base.” Leia told the little droid, a soft smile adorning her still-beautiful face.

* * *

Aboard a Resurgent-class Star Destroyer orbiting Mustafar the bridge was disrupted by the heavy footsteps of Supreme Leader Kylo Ren.

“What is this?” He seethed, wishing he could throw the datapad to the wall as he approached the redheaded General who was drinking calmly from his cup of caf; watching the stars outside the viewport. Several officer’s heads snapping discreetly to steal a glance at their elusive now helmet-less leader.

“We’ve just decoded the message sent from the Unknown Regions.” Hux informed the towering man beside him as he continue to sip his warm beverage. “We haven’t been able to pin-point exactly from where it was sent.”

“This is a call to war! Openly challenging the First Order’s rule and my authority.” Kylo spat, his gloved fists clenched at his sides. “You, however, do not look to be concerned General.”

The General was quick to suppress the snort that almost escaped his pale lips. “The Emperor has been dead for many years, Supreme Leader. I’m certain we’ll get to the bottom of this in no time.”

Kylo fell into an abrupt brooding silence at the General’s side.

“Who else has received this message?” Kylo asked the ever nervous Lieutenant Mitaka, who was seemingly enthralled at the console before him, lest anger the Supreme Leader.

“I-It has been broadcasting to the e-entire Holonet for five hours, s-sir.” The dark-haired lieutenant spluttered shakily to his superior; holding his breath for the reaction from his Supreme Leader. Mitaka having been his assistant for years, knew all too well of the havoc Kylo Ren caused when he was angry or frustrated.

“Five hours.” Kylo grit his teeth, his lips curled in an animalistic snarl. It was beyond comprehension. “And I’ve been informed of this only now?”

“As I’ve stated before, sir.” Hux was quick to his defense. “We’ve only just been able to decode the message. I doubt anybody else has been able to. We have the best code breakers in the galaxy.” His chest swelling up in pride at the mention of his men.

It unnerved Kylo to see how much Hux enjoyed being in power. The little weasel adored the moments when he could flaunt the full extent the might of the First Order. Be it with their allies or to anyone who would lend an ear.

Kylo’s voice was barely controlled and plainly displeased when he spoke: “We haven’t been able to crush the feeble Resistance. Not to mention the incident on Agamar,” Referring to the act of defiance by the small agricultural world where the farmers lay waste to their own fields, billions of prime farmland going up in flames, the Agamarian people refusing to cooperate with the First Order. “Are you sure we’re not becoming a laughable organization in the eyes of the galaxy?”

“Even if we were –which we are not– no one would laugh in our face with a blaster pointed to their skulls.” Hux sniffed, handing his now empty cup to a tech aid by his side. “We will get to the bottom of this, Supreme Leader.”

The rage simmering below Kylo Ren’s poor attempt of a calm demeanor was palpable. “The Knights and I will be going planet-side,” His eyes betraying nothing as they stared to the red world below them. “I expect results by the time I get back, General. For your sake.”

Hux was not afraid of him, wary yes, but never afraid. Which is why he doesn’t flinch when Ren throws the casual threat. He merely responds with a level heded: “Certainly, sir.” Restraining himself from saying anything further as he watched Ren exit the bridge, his beady blue eyes shining with disdain.

Careful not to show on his face the hatred that flowed from him towards Ren’s direction.

* * *

Rey loved Kashyyk. She truly did.

This was the biggest Resistance Base she had ever seen in their entire year of relocating. Chewie had mentioned briefly how this had been an old Wookie village before the Empire had relocated them all to the coal mines and work camps. But that was all she knew seeing as he didn’t like to talk about those dark times.

There was so much green as far as the eye could see. More than Takodana and Ahch-To together. And standing here with the wind rustling the canopies above her, Rey felt she could live and die contently here. “So what’s for breakfast?” She asked Finn as they walked through the bridges towards the mess hall or mess hut.

“Mash.” Finn replied with a grin. The hodgepodge Boolio –the Resistance’s cook– called mash was a mix of porridge, berries, roots and bantha milk that had become sort of the go-to breakfast food since they arrived on the planet. If anything, Rey and Finn were the only ones who actually _liked_ eating his food after years of eating nothing but rations and veg-meet.

They weaved their way through the throes of Resistance fighters to get to where Poe was holding up the line as he tried to distract Boolio an extra two trays tucked underneath his armpit. “We’re here.” Finn whispered in Poe’s ear, clapping his shoulder in greeting and handing Rey her tray.

“Hey!” Someone called from behind them. “That’s not fair Poe! No cutting.”

“Snap, it’s mash again.” Poe pointed out. “I doubt you’re eager to eat it for the _tenth_ time!” He gritted his teeth towards Boolio. Who had insisted _‘If Jedi eat, you all eat.’_ After multiple attempts of negotiation from Poe and Snap.

“Carry on!”

They had just sat down when Rose came running towards them with a worried expression on her face. “You three,” She gasps; trying hard to catch her breath. “Are needed in the war room.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is! Short and simple for the first chapter but it took me waaaay to long to have the guts to post this. Thank you so much to my wonderful beta @always-untilstarsburnout, follow us on Tumblr! (Mine is @all-that-is-gold) I hope you like it :)


	2. The Oracle

Kylo wished he hadn’t destroyed his helmet.

His throat was burnt by smoke and he couldn’t blink fast enough to keep away the dryness he felt in his eyes.

Mustafar was a hellscape of a planet. The air was hazy with ash and the entire horizon a mix of red and orange from the lava rivers just a few paces away from the black land that crumpled beneath the small party’s footsteps. As they approached their destination, despite the almost barren landscape, Kylo felt the teeming life of the planet connected through the Force. From the iron tree forest a few klicks away that the native Mustafarians had worked so hard on cultivating to the extremophile organisms that swarmed the lava flows.

It was no wonder to him why his grandfather had chosen this planet ashome. He felt the Dark Side of the Force flow naturally from the crumpled ruins of Fortress Vader.

A low whistle came from the figure who had come to stand next to Kylo. “What a _dump_.” came the low rumble of Ap’Lek, his voice modulated by his helmet.

“Do you think maybe he was compensating for something?” Kuruk quipped as he walked towards them; elbowing Ap’Lek as he did so.

“Quiet, you two.” Trudgen, the oldest of them all, grumbled from where he stood a few steps behind. After the events aboard _The Supremacy_ , Kylo had personally tracked down all of his Knights from where Snoke had them posted and called them to join him aboard _The Steadfast_. The Knights of Ren would follow where their Master led.

“Who goes there?” A voice called out from within the castle.

The Knights immediately took hold of their respective weapon’s awaiting Kylo’s orders. But Kylo only gripped the hilt of the lightsaber he still had clipped onto his belt. Not yet igniting it.“The Supreme Leader of the First Order.” He announced proudly.

“Ha! The remnants of the Empire do not reign here!” The voice retorted.

Kylo’s face contorted into an impatient scowl. “Show yourself.” He commanded. He didn’t know what kind of creature emerged from the dark bowels of Fortress Vader. Suddenly its spidery form came to view. Kylo’s eyes widened fractionally.

“I am Delphi, Oracle of Mustafar.” The creature introduced itself. Somehow he sensed this creature was ancient and powerful in the Force. The spidery being regarded him for a moment. “Many cycles have passed since a Skywalker stood before me. What is it that you have come to seek?”

How this creature knew the true identity of Darth Vader and that he was related to him, Kylo did not know nor did he question it. This being was wise. He merely replied: “Answers.”

“Answers, answers, answers.” The creature said with a slight tilt of its head. “Others have come before you looking for the same thing you seek. I must warn you…the fortress will only reveal its secrets to those worthy of them.”

“The Dark Side is in my bloodline.” Kylo muttered the same line Snoke had whispered in his ear all those years. “Fortress Vader is my _birthright_.”

The Oracle contemplated him before it spoke: “Follow me.” Its legs clicking on the rusted durasteel as it retreated into the darkness once more.

“Stay here.” Kylo nodded to the Knights. He could sense their hesitance and he couldn’t blame them. He unclipped his lightsaber from his belt and switched it on. The familiar crackle offering a small comfort while he continued to follow the Oracle into the castle.

“For you to see,” The Oracle’s voice echoed eerily within the fortress. “You must acknowledge your true self, Son of Skywalker…or is it Son of Solo?”

“Those names mean nothing to me.” He snaps with a snarl. “This is my true self.”

“Liar.” The Oracle squinted knowingly. “Do you really think I do not sense the presence of the Light within you?” Kylo paled at this; panic setting in. Here he was in the remnants of Vader’s home with a creature he had just met! Somehow Snoke had been right, he had too much of his father’s stupidity and tendency to walk head on to dangerous situations. “You killed your father but this was for naught. You fight against your mother yet you think of her wellbeing before your cause.”

Kylo shook his head. “Those people _abandoned_ me. They never wanted me.”

“The girl,” the Oracle continued with a hum almost ignoring Kylo’s presence completely. “She is your Light.” Not a question but a fact the creature stated. At Kylo’s silence the creature pressed on. “You care for her.”

“She is nobody.” Kylo was quick to deflect. “A scavenger who bested me before. It won’t happen again.” He spat out in frustration. “I’ll destroy her.”

A squealing noise filled whatever chamber the creature had led him to. It took a moment for Kylo realize that the creature was laughing at him. “You lie, _Kylo Ren_.” The circular room was decorated with murals of ancient Sith Lords engaging the Jedi of the Old Republic in battle. “The darkness runs through your veins. This is true but the light is a thorn in your heart that wedges itself deeper with each day that your conflicted _feelings_ for the scavenger girl evolve.”

A muscle below his eye twitched at this and his chest rose with each shaky breath he took. The creature that called itself the Oracle had just outed his innermost thoughts.

It led him to a part of the wall where a single being was depicted. In some locked away memory, he recognized that it was a representation of the Son; one of the old Mortis gods. He had learned from Luke Skywalker that the Ones were thought to have been manifestations of the Force itself, and that the Son represented the Dark Side of the Force.

“Kneel.” The Oracle instructed. Kylo gulped and did as he was told. “Ask that which you seek, Son of Skywalker.”

“Answers.” He said shakily.

Suddenly, the mural’s eyes glowed red; the light filling the room in its hue. Then Kylo’s vision went white.

*** * ***

“It can’t be!” Poe cried out incredulously. His shocked look shared with the rest of the Resistance’s command and the holo-projections of their few precious allies scattered across the galaxy. “You’re telling me that _somehow_ Palpatine has returned?!”

“How is this possible?” Bo-Katan Kryze’s holo frowned towards Leia. “Your brother destroyed him. He can’t be back.”

“Luke ended him I know it.” Leia replied sternly her voice unwavering; forever faithful to her brother.

“So what, Palpatine has been out there all this time?” Exclaimed Poe with his hands on his hips and his jaw clenched. “Do you think he’s behind the First Order?”

“I don’t think this has anything to do with the Order.” Piped up Lieutenant Connix, who had been the one to decode the intel from the holonet. “This was broadcasted to the entire galaxy from an unknown channel.”

“Oh great! So now we have _two_ tyrannical maniacs to deal with?!” Poe continued. The General ignored the terrible ache in her heart at the insult towards her son.

Suddenly, a splitting white hot pain erupted within Rey’s brain; making her clutch her head in her hands and gasp out in shock. “Rey?” Finn rushed to her side with a concerned etched on his face. “Are you all right?”

Rey shook her head, clutching it with her hands tighter than before. “S-something’s happening with…” She grits out in pain. Leia is with her in an instant.

“Find out what’s going on,” Leia instructs Poe and Connix. “I’m taking Rey to her room.”

“I’ll come help you, Gen–“ Finn began but was promptly interrupted by Leia.

“No. You’re needed here Finn.” Leia told him sternly while she circled one arm behind Rey’s back and helping her outside the war room and leaving behind a room full of confused people. “Your connection grows stronger every day.” Leia sighed as they walked on towards the barracks. She knew that the young Jedi and her wayward son had a bridge of some sorts between their mindsbut did not know how deep it ran. It would seem that Rey didn’t either. Her feeling pain that wasn’t hers was new. “What’s happened?” She asked, wiping some of the tears away from the young woman’s cheeks.

“I don’t know.” Rey sniffed, still clutching her head and walking as best as she could. “I just felt this horrible pressure in the back of my head. It feels like something is clawing its way in…I-I don’t know how else to describe it.” She sobs, biting her lip strong enough to quickly draw blood.

At the sight of Rey’s distress, Leia rushed towards her own personal hut that was far more closer than Rey’s. “Come here,” Leia tells her softly, gently prying her head from her hands and guiding her down onto the bed. She sat right next to her.

“Close your eyes and breathe, Rey.” The older woman instructed while her small hands massaged Rey’s scalp and the girl’s bright hazel eyes closed. “Let go of all thought. Let go of all fear.” It took a few minutes of Leia whispering this for Rey’s forehead that had been scrunched up in pain to relax. Rey’s own breathing evening out from the heaves they had been moments before.

With a soft gasp the girl’s eyes opened once more. “How did you learn to do that?” Rey asked in awe.

“This old woman still has some tricks up her sleeves.” Leia smiled fondly, her fingers continuing to card through Rey’s soft hair. “Luke taught me that.” She explained softly. “It helped with Ben’s nightmares.”

“He had nightmares?” Rey queried with wide eyes and raised eyebrows.

Leia nodded. “They were really bad.” She sighed. “But the headaches were the worst.” A faraway look glossed over Leia’s features as they often did when she talked about Ben.

So Rey decided to gently change the subject. “Did Luke teach you other things?”

“Well he tried.” Leia laughed. “Although, I might have been just as good with a lightsaber as he was…maybe even better.” She joked with an easy-going shrug. Rey chuckling with her.

“Why didn’t you train with him?” Rey asked her.

“I had a vision,” Leia’s eyes glossed over once more, her mind deep in thought at the memory. “Another life called to me.”

“Ben?” Rey concluded softly. Leia’s hands stilled in her hair.

“I-I sensed that…if I continued my Jedi training…My son would die.” Leia gulped this time, blinking back her own tears as the memory of that vision floated back crystal clear in her mind. “So, I served the galaxy in a different way.”

Rey gulped. Leia could sense that the girl’s mind had a million questions formed. But then she asked only one: “Do you sense that fate still?”

Leia knew of course –had suspected it for some time– that Rey cared for her son. She had to in some capacity if the girl had shipped herself across enemy territory for him. But Leia could see it there, the fear she felt mirrored in Rey’s face. The fear that plagued her dreams at night. The death of her son. “I don’t.” She answers truthfully. “But the Force works in mysterious ways.” Leia acknowledged with a resigned sigh and somewhat disappointed expression on her face.

“Tell me about it.” Rey snorts, scrunching up her nose. “I can still sense the light in him even after…everything.” She confesses to the older woman.

Leia gave her a small smile. The few moments she could talk about her son were precious to her. “Even before he was born, Ben was this bright star of light. Now…he’s like a flicker of it. Just a tiny spark.”

“I just…I thought I knew him behind the cracks of his mask.” Rey contemplated, repeating something she had said to Leia when she first learned of their bond. “I thought it would be enough.” Leia nodded at this. For no matter how many years had passed and what he had done she was still his mother.

And she still held out hope that her son would save himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry!! I've had two very busy weeks and couldn't find the time to post. Once again thank u so much to the most wonderful beta reader @always-untilstarsburnout!! Kudos, Comments and Shares are greatly appreciated <3


	3. An Inconvenient Truth

“What are we going to do General?”

The Resistance command stood huddled in the war room where they had been for the last day after the transmission. Poe, Finn, Rose, Connix, Aftab Ackbar, Commander D’Acy, and Threepio. Rey wasn’t there because Leia had insisted remain in bed until she felt better. They all stared at Leia, the legendary rebel who fought in the first galactic civil war, now older than what she had been then. But within her that same fire to fight for what’s right.

Except, Leia felt terrified.

Luke rarely spoke of what happened when he went to Darth Vader on the Death Star but Leia could sense her brother’s emotions when he did. Fear. Anger. Hatred. Feelings he often associated with the dark side of the Force. And if the galaxy feared his lap dog Vader, they were just as terrified if not more of his master.

His existence ever-present in the back of Leia’s mind since she was a toddler living in Alderaan. He was smart, determined, and disgustingly power hungry. There was no telling what he was capable of.

“Wait…do we really believe this?” Poe huffed incredulously in that foul toned mooed he had been for the past few days.

Aftab Ackbar sighed, “It cannot be. The Emperor is dead,” he insisted with a shake of his head. “He was killed aboard the second Death Star!” His wide eyes wanted for anybody to agree with him and Poe. For anybody to say their worst nightmares wasn’t back.

Leia shook her head. “There are…different abilities of the Force. It may be possible The Sith were known for their secrets.” She told them shakily. Luke had said as much when he had been younger and hunted for Sith artifacts. His notes within the ancient Jedi texts Rey had brought with her from Ahch-To seemed to indicate that Sheev Palpatine had been obsessed with eternal life. Had even bragged to it to who was once Anakin Skywalker, Luke thought it was yet another lie the power hungry man had told their father to lure him to the dark side. But what if there was truth to it?

“You heard what the transmission said.” Finn addressed Poe with an exasperated face. “He’s been planning his revenge!”

“How do we know if any of this is true!” Poe shot back.

“He has followers,” Bo-Katan Kryze spoke up chuckling mirthlessly. “They call themselves the Sith Eternal. They might be worse than the First Order.”

“The Sith Eternal?” Leia fretted. She had heard of them.The New Republic had known of their presence for years. They were a cult and they most certainly were worse than the First Order. But they were just as elusive. “Do you really think they might be behind all this?”

“I wouldn’t cross them out just yet.” She crossed her arms in front of her chest as the holo-projection crackling from where the Mand’alor was in her fortress back on Mandalore. “The question is, where did the transmission come from?”

This time it was lieutenant Connix who spoke: “It really could have been from anywhere.” She informed them. “The message was encrypted. All of it. The message itself and its origin.” She shook her head.

“We believe it has come from a place uncharted on any starmap. Quite frankly it may be possible we never decode it.” Threepio added with his characteristic pessimism.

“Let’s try being positive, Threeps.” Finn said seriously rolling his eyes at the ever pessimistic golden protocol droid. 

“Do you think the First Order has already…” D’Acy trailed off quietly Her blue eyes wide with mortification.

“Definitely.” Finn nodded solemnly. “They have some of the brightest individuals working intelligence for them. I wouldn’t be surprised if their codebreakers already figured it out.” He said with a deflated sigh. So much for being positive. "I strongly suggest against seeking out an independent one.” He said, sharing a knowing look with Rose, earning a wince from the young woman.

“So what?” Poe huffed with his hands on his hips and his chest puffed up in that macho bravado of his that Leia was trying so hard to rid him from. But his head was always in the cockpit most of the time he’d make a good leader…when the time came. “We just sit around and wait for a new Empire to rise?”

“They’ll crush us once and for all!” Aftab exclaimed. “My father warned this day would come.”

Everyone’s face had fallen. They were all thinking the same thing.

“We’re not ready,” Leia admitted with a sigh. “Only half of our ships are working and we have no large-scale weapons.” She reminded them. Leia really hated being the voice of reason but if resources had been scarce when the Resistance started…now they were stretched thin. Certainly no amount of money from her personal savings could fund an entire rebellion effort.

Rose lifted her chin. “So we fix them. Fast.” She declared. “We’ll be ready.”

Leia pondered it for a moment. It wouldn’t hurt. They needed to be prepared. Who knows what those loons were planning. “Alright. Go ahead.” Leia agreed, making Rose nod enthusiastically. “This is all we can do for now.” She sighed running a hand through her face. “Meeting adjourned. Go get some dinner.”

*** * ***

Rey had thrown up a total of five times since the headache had receded from her mind and had sobbed through three of them. She hadn’t stopped sweating even if it was the beginning of winter on Kashyyk. Rey truly felt disgusting.

“Rey?” Came a knock on her door. Expecting Finn she waved her hand and the door opened easily to reveal General Organa holding a bowl in her hand. “Can I come in?” At the girl’s nod and mumble ‘of course’, Leia made her way inside the small hut. Leia looked at Rey. This young, brave girl who had all but stumbled by accident on this conflict in which the fate of the galaxy was at stake. Only Leia knew of course this wasn’t a coincidence.

It was the Force.

Leia wasn’t as diligent with learning about it as her brother was far too preoccupied with trying to patch together the galaxy and raise a child (which wasn’t her shining moment) to really pay attention that everything happened as the Force willed it to be.

“I’ve brought you something light to fill your stomach and Artoo is posted outside your door so you can yell for him if you need anything.” Leia informed her moving the only chair in the room to sit next to Rey who was trying to sit up. But her movements were still sluggish. Leia placed the bowl down on the nightstand and gently helped her sit up.

“It’s some bone broth,” The General explained almost…nervously after Rey had stared at the bowl. “Granted I don’t know to _what_ the bone belonged to. But it’s Chewie’s grandmother’s recipe and I can tell you it’s magical.”

Rey chuckled weakly at the mental image the thought of Chewie cooking conjured up. But Rey sipped on it gladly when General Organa lifted the spoon to her mouth and must admit the taste was pleasant as it warmed her throat.

After a few minutes of silence, Leia spoke once more. “I was wondering if perhaps we may use your connection to Ben…to my son for information about the Sith Eternal.”

“What do you mean General?” Rey asked her with a frown. “Do you think Ben knows something?”

Leia hummed in thought. “He may have an idea.” She shrugged. “He was quite the scholar that boy.”

“He seems pretty clueless to me.” Rey snorted in between spoonfuls of warm broth. It made Leia smirk fondly. Reminding her of how she had thought of Han when she was younger. The girl would deny it but she cared for Ben. Deep down she truly did.

“The Solo men are notorious for their pigheadedness.” Leia remarked with a bittersweet pang to her heart. The now empty bowl resting on her lap. “Sleep on it,” Leia patted her hand gently. “I know I’m asking a lot of you.” She got up and left the little room, letting Rey to her own thoughts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying something new this week with the spacing between paragraphs so if I like it I'll keep this format. Kudos, comments and shares are super appreciated. Hope u all had a great socially distanced Halloween! Many thanks to @alwaysuntilstarsburnout as always :)


	4. Who might understand?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the delay!! University has been kicking my butt lately so I'll update this chapter and then tomorrow I'll upload chapter 5!!. I didn't like the format I used on the last chapter (regarding the spacing of paragraphs) so I'll leave it as it was. Hope you are well wherever you are y'all <3 
> 
> Once again, many thanks to @alwaysuntilthestarsburnout for being my Beta reader. She's so patient and understanding. 
> 
> Kudos, comments and shares are always appreciated :)))

Rey hadn’t been able to sleep a wink all night after the conversation she had with Leia. Now that her head wasn’t throbbing, some laps around the lake a few clicks away would do her just fine.

The sun was already rising from behind the mountains, bathing the rapidly freezing planet in a chilly pink hue. Chewie said that spring was the best month to be on Kashyyk anyway.

Her breath came out in pants as she jogged what must have been her one-hundredth lap. Her legs were starting to give out beneath her, calves burning and thighs shaking. But Rey couldn’t stop thinking about what the General had suggested.

It had been a whole year since they had spoken. Any activation of the Force Bond was met with extreme denial on both sides. He had tried to talk to her at first. Sometimes he spoke so softly that it was almost a whisper and other times, his frustration turned to rage. But she was stubborn and more than a bit hurt that he had chosen power over their bond, over _her_. He quickly gave up when he realized she wasn’t going to talk back. A snide, dark part of herself had thought bitterly that of course he wouldn’t choose her.

_Nobody_ ever _chose her._

Rey shook her head from that thought. Because it wasn’t true. Han chose her when he asked her to join the Millenium Falcon’s crew. Finn chose her when he came back to rescue her on Starkiller Base. Leia had chosen her when she had asked her to search for Luke. And Luke had chosen her when he took her on as his last student –If only for a few days. Something rumbled deep within her chest. A familiar heart beating the same lonely tune as her own.

The morning world went quiet around her.

Rey sensed him before she saw him. She turned around and there he was. The mighty Kylo Ren, clad in black as always with his cape dramatically sweeping the ground. He stared at her —almost as if he were memorizing her - it was the first time the bond had opened in a long while. Rey had to admit she was openly gawking too. He looked as handsome as ever only his eyes held a weariness that she hadn’t seen before.

“Have you heard?” Rey huffed as she stretched her legs, a Force Bond wasn’t going to give her a cramp. “Palpatine’s back.” She drawled casually but the nervous flutter in her chest said otherwise.

“Yes, I’ve heard.” He gulped with a nod. “So did the entire galaxy apparently.”

“Oh?” Rey exclaimed. “Are we going to have a _new_ Supreme Leader?” She gibed sarcastically as she continued to walk around the lake. The crunching of leaves behind her suggesting he was following. “Or are you going to serve another master.”

“No. I have other plans,” Of course he did. “enough of them for me not to be concerned over a fanatics’ threats.”

Rey stopped in her tracks and turned around then. “I hope you’re referring to the First Order,” She deadpanned. “Seeing as you’re the only fanatics of the Empire.”

“Don’t be naive, Rey.” He rolled his eyes irked at what she had said. “There’s more to this than meets the eye.”

Ah. Perhaps he _wasn’t_ so clueless after all.

“Alright then,” Rey frowned. “Explain it to me.” She prodded. Her mind closed off from him so he would not be able to sense her true intentions. “What is it that I don’t understand?”

“Why would I share First Order secrets with a homeless criminal?” He retorted with a single raven eyebrow raising towards his hairline.

Rey scoffed at the petulant –yet _creative_ – insult and rolled her eyes. “You are a child.” Rey continued walking until she was back towards the main trail that led to the base. Leia would just have to make do with what little information they had, Kylo wasn’t going to talk.

“Hey.” Finn greeted her as she arrived. “Bit chilly to be running laps.”

“Hey,” Rey breathed her hands on her hips. “Yeah I– just couldn’t sleep.” She explained it knowing Finn wouldn’t push her for more than she wanted to share. Not that she’d want to share she had a connection with their sworn enemy.

“Happens.” He nodded warming his hands with his hot breath. “I’m sure you’ll sleep now. You must have done about a thousand laps.” He teased sitting down next to where she had sat on a crate.

“I have a lot on my mind.” She shrugged trying to seem nonchalant about it.

“No kidding!” Finn chuckled. “If I was the galaxy’s last hope I wouldn’t sleep at all!” He laughed except stopped abruptly when he saw Rey pale at the comment. “Sorry, didn’t mean to put you on the spot. Of course there’s lots of hope in the galaxy.” He amended clearing his throat awkwardly. “Y’know, there’s a lot of people who are fighting for the cause! Could be more – _sure_ – but the important thing is that you–

“You’re not helping.” She rolled her eyes with a smile on her face that indicated there was no harm done.

“I know.”

They chuckled lightly, the sunlight warming them only fractionally. “I just…hadn’t really thought of it that way, I guess.” Rey mumbled softly.

“Listen…you’re the best fighter we have but” He admitted. “Out there?” Finn pointed at the sky that was now dulling to the grey that always seemed to loom on the planet. “There’s millions of people who want to fight for freedom. You are not alone.”

The shiver that ran down her spine wasn’t from the cold. “I-I know that.” Rey agreed with a nod. “It’s just…difficult.”

“I get that.” Finn tells her honestly wrapping an arm around her in that instantly comforting way of his. “They win by making you think you’re alone.”

“Hey!” Poe called out bounding down a makeshift turbolift. “What are you all doing up so early?” He yawned with a hand coming to rub the drowsiness from his eyes.

“Should ask you that,” Finn teased elbowing him as he sat down. “You don’t sleep. You hibernate.”

“Finn, don’t call it that. It’s his _beauty sleep_.” Rey cooed with a smirk.

Finn let out a bark of laughter. “My apologies.”

“Laugh all you want.” Poe shrugged. “End of the day, I look better than both of you combined.” He tossed his curly hair dramatically to prove his point. Which made Finn laugh harder than he had before. And Rey smiled fondly at her friends and yet, it didn’t quite reach her eyes.

*** * ***

Kylo Ren paid the stormtroopers and officers no mind when he charged down the corridor towards the conference room. His mood improved but not by much after seeing Rey for the first time in three weeks.

All of the officers of the First Order’s High Command who were aboard the _Steadfast_ were already seated when he strode in. Quinn, Parnadee, Engell, Hux and a small handful of other’s he could not for the life of him remember their names.

“Please tell me you have called this meeting to inform me that we have been able to locate where the transmission was sent from.” Kylo said while he strode past the table and walked towards the view port. His gaze fixated on the blinking stars with his hands clasped behind his back.

“No, sir. Not yet.” The insufferable Hux answered quickly, making Kylo roll his eyes even though he knew the weasel couldn’t actually see it as he had his back towards the group. “My men are working diligently on the matter.”

Kylo waited a moment before he answered, “ _Your_ men?” Silence around the table ensued.

“O-our men, your men Supreme Leader.” Hux corrected, an afterthought. “The First Order’s men.” He tried amending. Kylo decided to let the subject drop as he turned around and faced the High Command.

“Then what is this meeting about, _General_ Hux?” Kylo asked the taut faced Hux while he pulled out the chair at the head of the table and proceeded to sit down.

“This, sir.” Hux said with raised eyebrow taking out a control from his pocket and activating one of the holo screens in the room. The lights immediately dimming.

Kylo stared on as the holo turned on and Dameron’s familiar face appeared on the screen. He was dressed in the usual orange pilot jumpsuit of the Resistance, holding on to his black helmet tightly. “ _We are the spark that’ll light the fire that will burn the First Order down.”_ Dameron said as X-Wings flew in a whiz overhead. _“Resist tyranny, resist oppression, join the Resistance!”_ He invited proudly with a dashing smile that Kylo knew they had chosen him for his traditionally good looks.

_Quite tacky if you ask me,_ Kylo thought with an annoyed huff but said nothing.

“There’s more, sir.” Hux cleared his throat as he clicked on the remote once more. Suddenly, the traitor FN-2187 appeared on screen. His hair was longer than the standard issue for male stormtroopers and he wore clothes that made him look like what a Resistance general would look like, rough around the edges but polished.

_“Like many who were stolen from their families, I was once a stormtrooper.”_ FN-2187 began his voice clear and collected. _“But on my first battle I decided that I would not fight for the Order. This is a call to arms to anybody within the First Order who wishes to defect.”_ The traitor’s eyes shone as he repeated the same sentence Dameron had said on the holo-vid before him: _“Resist tyranny, resist oppression, join the Resistance!”_

The screen darkened once more. The lights of the conference room flicked back on.

“I do believe this is far more important than chasing _ghosts_.” Hux quips with a slight smirk. “Considering we have had numerous deserters on–”

Kylo blinked. “I trust Lieutenant Mitaka has reported to you the details of my journey to Mustafar?” Cutting off Hux completely. Well, not all the details of course, he was still figuring out what he had seen.

“Yes, sir. About your… _vision_.” Quinn said with a sigh of irritation, a single skeptical brow raised. Kylo studied his officers. Some of them were old enough to be junior officers or cadets during the days of the Empire. Yet some like Quinn for example had little patience for the mysticism that entailed learning and studying the ways of the Force.

“We must figure out where the transmission was sent,” Kylo asserted, standing up once more to his towering full height, dwarfing the others who sat in the room. “That is our top priority for the moment. Not some silly propaganda videos the Resistance has made in a pitiful last attempt to get more recruits.” He sniffed disdainfully before exiting the conference room leaving behind a scowling group of individuals who turned to Hux.

*** * ***

Kylo was pacing.

He was pacing and he only did that when he was nervous. Kylo had been toying with this idea since he had visited Mustafar actually. If anything, he knew visions were fickle and often misleading; yet he couldn’t shake off the unnerved feeling after what he had seen.

Whatever he had said to Rey before, it was a lie. He was worried and if he was honest with himself a bit frightened of what he had seen.

The ancient commlink he had hidden from Snoke was placed on his black glass desk in his private quarters. Kylo walked towards it, nervously flexing his hands before he picked the older model up. He took a deep breath and turned it onsending his message to the one person who might understand what they were dealing with.


	5. Dark Visions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back to our regular programming I hope! Every Sunday. Kudos, comments and shares are much appreciated. <3

Leia waited nervously in the grimy cantina on the small moon of Varnak.

She’d be lying if she hadn’t almost had a heart attack when the old comlink binged its message. It was a simple encrypted code, short and to the point: _“Meet me in these coordinates in one standard day. I have information that must be discussed.”_ Leia didn’t know what to expect. She hadn’t seen her son in seven years. Would she be able to recognize the man he had become? Would it be her Ben who waited for her or would it be a monster in a mask? Leia hoped it wouldn’t be the latter.

“I really do appreciate the escort.” She told Bo-Katan and the other two members of Clan Kryze who had accompanied her considering Varnak was close to Mandalore.

“Don’t mention it, Your Highness.” The older woman waved her off. Leia stared into her own reflection on the Mand’alor helmet’s visor. “We’ll be over by the bar if you need us.” Bo-Katan nodded towards the circular bar filled to the brim with dodgy patrons.

Leia tapped her fingers on the booth’s table anxiously, a habit no amount of strict tutors could coax out of her. She stared at the chrono on the wall in front of her. He was twenty-five minutes and forty-six seconds late to be exact.

And that’s when she felt it.

It was like sensing the brightest star being born. The living band of light she had felt inside her womb was so clouded in darkness that it almost made her throw up the hasty breakfast she had eaten before leaving Kashyyk. Leia was not so attuned with the Force as Rey was, but she had felt Ben since he had first stirred inside her.

The booth behind her creaked with the old worn-out leather straining under the weight of someone. No, not just someone.

Her _son_.

She felt everything from him. Anger. Resentment. Fear. Nervousness. Self-loathing. Desperation. Each one stronger than the other. A moment of silence passed between the two where they could only hear the other’s breathing and the thundering hearts that threatened to break out of their ribcages. Then he spoke: “I assume the _mandos_ are with you?”

Not the first thing she would have thought he would say. “Yes, they came to–”

“Protect you from me?” He bit out accusingly.

“From harm’s way.” She corrected clearing her throat. “Is there any particular reason as to why we’re talking with our backs to each other?”

“Wouldn’t want to disappoint you. I didn’t inherit the _family’s_ fabled good looks.” He deflected with a snort. Yet the venom that laced the words was unmistakable. “We don’t have much time, let’s get down to business.” Ben began. “A message was sent from someone claiming to be the Emperor.”

Leia knew this of course. She had memorized the message:

_At last the work of generations is complete. The great error is corrected. The day of victory is at hand. The day of revenge. The day of the Sith._

She wasn’t sure what it really meant but Finn had been right in his guess that the Resistance hadn’t been the only one who had deciphered it and they most certainly wouldn’t be the only ones seeking answers.

“I went to Mustafar…to Fortress Vader. I had a vision there.” Ah, so that must have been what Rey had felt. Whatever he had seen, it clearly hadn’t been a pleasant experience if the trepidation in his voice was any indication. “I can’t explain it I-I have to show it to you.” He muttered, the leather creaking once more as he stood up abruptly, suddenly towering above her before sitting down on the opposite seat from her.

Leia blinked.

Gone was the gangly boy from her memories. In his place was a man who resembled his father too much; it made her heart squeeze painfully. The man had tousled dark waves of hair that reached just below those ears he had always loathed, an aquiline nose he had inherited from his father, full lips. And she could see it now, what everyone had always said– he had her eyes.

The only thing that set him apart from the rest of the people in the cantina was the thin scar that bisected his face where Rey had tried to cleave him in half; the scar disappearing below his dark high-necked robes. He too seemed to be enthralled by her appearance. She must look older than heck.

Leia Organa sure felt like it after having to fight wars for most of her life.

Ben blinked and outstretched a gloved hand across the table, “You need to see this.” He implored. Leia took a deep breath before placing her much smaller hand in his. She watched in awe as her son closed his eyes and sent her his vision as gently as he could.

_The Force was strong here. Wherever ‘here’ was._

_Stronger than almost anything he had ever felt in his life. Of all the things he’d seen in all of his years, this one was the strangest of them all. Stranger yet, it didn’t seem to have a side. Dark nor Light._

_It just was._

_Flowing and ebbing like the tide of a never ending ocean._

_This place, if one could call it that, had no beginning and no end. Time and space flowed freely here like a place of in-between. The past, the present and the future merged together. With life and death’s fine line palpable in the air._

_A wolf howled in the distance and before he could see any further, the place where he had been, shifted into red sands. The desert held many secrets, the dark flowing freely from it like a spring. Death reigned in this place. He felt cold. A cold so intense it seeped into his very bones._

_He sensed…a presence here._

_Ancient. Weak and barely noticeable._

_He couldn’t know how he could tell but the presence seemed almost familiar in a way. It was coming closer, like a breeze that gently caressed his face, lifting the ends of his hair and clothes._

_He lifted a hand to touch it–_

_Lightning crackled and he was within a temple, his footsteps echoed as his boots came in contact with the bare, cracked stone underneath. He was not alone, creatures that reminded him of Snoke’s caretakers moved in the shadows, their threadbare black robes turning them into shadows as well; if they sensed him or saw him they give no indication._

“At last,” _Came a voice from the darkness, raspy and straining as though in pain, yet the sound reverberated through his very being._ “Long have I waited for this moment. Finally, Snoke’s apprentice shows himself.” _The eery voice rang through the temple._

_Kylo turned to where the voice came from, igniting his lightsaber. Coming face to face with Palpatine, more carcass than anything. Yet, he didn’t feel his life Force. No. This was_ something _else._ “I killed Snoke. I will destroy you too.” _Kylo tells him with disdain, his lightsaber never dropping from his hand._

“Did you now?” _Palpatine lets out a maniacal laugh at this._ “My boy,” _The Emperor sneers, gross yellowing teeth peeking out from the hood he hid his deformed face._ “I have been every voice,” _He said._ “you have ever heard.” _Snoke’s all too familiar growl rumbled out of his mouth._ “Inside your _head_.” _Darth Vader’s mechanical voice breathed._

_No._

_Everything he had ever thought. Was a_ lie _. They_ all _had lied to him._

_More and more visions were thrust into his mind. Disappearing as quickly as they appeared._

_He saw Snoke finding the Emperor’s ring on the wreckage of the second Death Star. A ritual of some sort where a dagger made out of red crystal was plunged into Snoke’s chest._

_He saw himself through the eyes of the rest of Luke Skywalker’s pupils when the secret of his family’s dark lineage was revealed. The disgust, the hatred, the_ fear _._

_He saw a young boy with dark hair huddled in an all too familiar ship, clutching his head, afraid of the voices inside his head._

_“_ Ben. _” The voices whisper._

_He heard a familiar mechanical breath It_ haunted _his dreams at night. All this time, Palpatine had been the whispering voice that had comforted, guided and tormented him. How could that be?_

_Kylo raised his red saber to strike, his face curled up in a snarl._ “No need for that, as you can see.” _The Emperor muses at his own predicament._

“What are you?” _Kylo asked the Emperor, eyeing the Sith Lord– a legend of destruction– before him._

“The Dark Side of the Force is a pathway many might consider unnatural.” _The corpse smiled at the young man. His face wrinkling at the gesture. “_ I am the one who has foreseen your destiny. The one who has foreseen your greatness. You will succeed where Vader did not, you will end the Jedi once and for all. I will give you the power your family was foolish enough to refuse and together… we shall create a new Empire.”

_Kylo’s surroundings disappeared into a fog, as yet another vision filled his mind._

_There was a black void, where tens upon thousands of massive Star Destroyers hovered in waiting._

“For a generation, my disciples have labored,” _Emperor Palpatine said, his voice dark and deep._ “They’ve built a fleet that will bring an end to the galactic rebellion.” _The vision was whisked away, replaced by one of hundreds of thousands of stormtroopers, shining in crimson armor. Thunderous marching filled his ears, they rang like bringers of death._

“You’ll die first.” _Kylo said, shaking his head free of the vision within a vision._

“I’m already dead.” _The Emperor smirked tauntingly._ “Which is why the fleet will be yours, once you join me.”

_Kylo sensed deception in his words, but also truth. He wonders what it was the Emperor’s apparition actually wanted. Kylo was no fool. No Sith –especially one as powerful as Darth Sidious– would renounce control over the galaxy._ “And if I don’t?” _Kylo asked in challenge._

_The Emperor’s face wrinkled into a grotesque smile:_ “The girl will die.”

_No deception this time, only truth._

Leia heaved as Ben’s vision receded from her mind, his hand grasping hers tighter as her smaller frame was wracked with sobs, tears filling her eyes and falling down her cheeks. He was by her side in an instant kneeling before her with his dark eyes wide.

“Oh Ben.” Leia sobbed in agony, not caring she reached out and caressed his face. “If only I had known. Why didn’t you tell me? I would have helped you! I–

Ben let out a shaky breath, his gloved hands coming to rest on top of hers. “We can’t change the past.” He croaked with a sad grimace. “No matter how much we want to, _General Organa_.”

Leia shook her head ferociously. “No. Don’t you dare call me that. That’s not who I am to you.”

Regret, self-loathing and pure agony swam within the dark eyes that belonged to her son as he said brokenly: “I can’t. Not after what I’ve done.”

Leia let out a choked sob as she did the one thing she had wanted to do for so long, she grabbed him by the hem of his neck and yanked him into a tight embrace; her hands burying themselves into his impossibly soft hair.

“Listen to me Ben Solo,” She hiccuped, relishing in the way he hugged her back after a moment. “I’ve held out hope for you since the day you left. And that will _never_ change.” Leia held on tighter than she had ever embraced anyone before. And she didn’t care if lots of heads had turned towards them; including the Mandalorians. She was holding her only child. “I have loved you since before you were born and I will love you until my last breath.”

Ben’s shoulders shook as he also began to cry earnestly. “I wish I could take it all back.” He didn’t need to specify. They both knew what he was talking about. About _who_ he was talking about.

“I know, sweetheart.” Leia kissed her son’s hair rubbing his back in an attempt to calm him. Absentmindedly, she began to hum an old Alderaniaan lullaby like she had always done when he was a baby.

She had flash backs of holding the tiny infant to her chest, his pitch-black hair still wet from birth. His first steps. His first words. The first time he had lifted the small building blocks above his head when he was a toddler with the power of the Force. How sad he had been when they had left him with Luke.

“ _Ben_ ,” Leia whispered –because he would always be Ben to her– reaching for his smooth chin and lifting it so they could see each other’s teary-eyed faces. “Come with me. Help us fight whatever this is. We’ll figure it out, _together_.”

Ben shook his head. “It’s too late.” He bit out, standing up so suddenly that Leia felt a pain in her chest at the loss of touch. Leia felt this might be something he had convinced himself into believing. That they wouldn’t take him back after what he had done.

“No it’s not Ben.” She pleaded extending a hand to touch his cheek. He flinched at this action. And Leia had to wonder how long it had been since he had been touched and embraced this way. She wished she had done it more when she had the chance. “Leave here with me, come _home_.”

“I didn’t come to talk to you about our complicated history.” He sniffed, clearing his throat while he gently detached her hand from his cheek. Ben considered her for a second before continued on like nothing had ever happened; his voice becoming detached once more: “The Emperor isn’t alive, but his followers are. You know, don’t you?”

Leia nodded, her heart deflating. She remembered what Bo-Katan had said and the New Republic intel she had read since then. “They call themselves the _Sith Eternal_. But all I know about them comes from rumors, hearsay and word-of-mouth.” Leia sighed. She didn’t know too much. Nobody did, really. Only that the cult was made up of true believers in the Dark Side of the Force, much more than say the Night Sisters of Dathomir. They were far worse. They devoted their entire life to the Darkness; utterly consumed by it.

“You need to keep Rey safe.” Ben pleaded urgently. “If he knows about her existence, then his followers will do too.” He ran an anxious hand through his hair, a habit he had learned from his father. “They want her dead.”

“Yes of course, but,” Leia agreed obviously, she had grown fond of the girl and she was arguably the galaxy’s last Jedi. But she couldn’t help the small smirk that formed on her lips. “I’m not the one who’s attacking her, hot shot.” She pointed out with a raised eyebrow and a pointed glare.

Ben winced. “I’m working on it.” He mutters apologetically. His eyes widened fractionally as if he was almost forgetting something and then reached out for something from his pocket. Ben took out a single data stick. “The First Order is narrowing down the list of possible locations where your little rebels might be hiding.” He informed her, sliding the data stick towards her. “That is a list of planets they have already disregarded and so, will not check again. It’s the least I can do for the moment.”

Leia frowned at this. “Why are you doing this?”

Without hesitation he said simply: “Rey.” Ben’s voice left no space for other questions. Leia nodded taking the data stick and shoving it into her own pocket.

After a beat he said, “I should go. High Command has probably noticed my absence by now.” He stood up, once again towering above her. She was used to it of course but not from her own son.

She stood up too. “Are you sure you–” Leia stopped talking once she saw his face, it was one of tortured agony. The face of a man who had made his bed and now had to lie on it. Leia wished her son could see that there were people who still believed in him. Who waited for him to come home.

With a pained sigh, Leia slid her wedding ring off of her finger; caressing the twin sapphires. Han had it made specifically for her after they had found out she was pregnant with Ben. She extended it towards Ben, his brows scrunched up in confusion for a moment before recognition dawned on his face.

“If…you ever want to come back.” Leia gulped. “This will ensure your safety.” Ben hesitated before ultimately taking the ring from her, his giant hand fisting around it. She nodded contently, it was the least she could do. “Clear skies, Ben. May the Force be with you.” Leia told her only son earnestly, studying his face once more. And then he did something unexpected.

He pulled her into an embrace of his own.

Ben had comically folded himself into her to furrow his nose into the crook of her neck and she wrapped his arms around her boy. “I love you too, _mom_.” He whispered in her ear before pulling away and walking out the door, leaving her utterly dumbfounded to stare at his large retreating form.

* * *

Rey hates the cold.

She utterly despises the cold and so– she utterly despises snow. Of course snow had excited her at first because of its novelty; the only snow she had seen before was back on Starkiller Base and there wasn’t a lot of time to dwell on the beauty of it. Then because of the so called ‘snowball fights’ Poe and Rose insisted on playing with Finn and her. But now, they were into their third day of it –because apparently winter arrived in light speed on Kashyyk– and Rey almost missed the Jakku desert. _Almost._

Still, Rey had to train.

The relatively fresh snow on the ground crunched beneath her boots as she ran the makeshift training course. Rey bounded over fallen trees, dodged the low hanging branches. Sweat soaked her collar and dripped in small beads down her temples. Rey had shed some of her thicker, outer layers and remained in a borrowed Mandalorian thermo-suit. Rey had already taken out the first two spherical training remotes and now came the part she dreaded the most. BB-8 was waiting for her by the edge of the now almost frozen over lake. He warbled at her.

“Give me a second, Bee-Bee.” She panted, wiping the sweat from her brow with the back of her hand. Leia had called this part of the improvised course “Trust”. The exercise consisted in running through the lake, atop the drifting ice from one end to the other without falling of course; blindfolded. It was an exercise for concentration and obviously, trust in the Force. As of yet, Rey hadn’t succeeded.

This act in and of itself terrified her to no end. Rey had never learned how to swim and something told her that aside from that fact, the water was obviously freezing.

BB-8 bleated his encouragement, his robotic claw extending from its compartment. He outstretched the red blindfold towards her. Rey gulped as she took it and put it on, tying it with a double knot at the back of her head.

“Here goes nothing.” She muttered shakily taking a deep breath through her nose and letting herself be guided by her connection to the Force that surrounded her. Connecting to the Force was becoming easier with each day that passed. Rey heard the caw of birds overhead, she sensed the little furry creatures that burrowed underground, she felt everything through the Force.

Rey extended her leg and stepped onto the first cracked ice.

She hardly realized what she was doing once raw instinct took over. Rey continued to tiptoe away further from the mainland and into the middle of the lake. The drifting ice chunks were slippery as she stepped on them, her foot splashing the water. BB-8 let out a shrill squeal in warning when she missed a step and fell waist deep into the lake. The freezing water felt like a thousand knives were being stabbed all over her body.

A rolling dark cloud of frustration grew inside her.

Rey grit her teeth and clung to the ice; trying to pull herself up. Fear threatened to seize her when her hand slipped and suddenly she was bobbing in and out of the water, hands and legs flailing. Her lungs burning from the icy water she was swallowing.

BB-8 already busy with sending a message to whoever could come and rescue her.

Rey let out a growl, grabbing onto the ice until her fingertips split open and her warm blood trickled down, mixing red and white. She couldn’t think of anything as she finally, pulled all of her body onto the ice once more. Rey was coughing, letting out the water inside her lungs from that split second she had almost drowned. Her entire body was already shivering and her teeth were chattering as the thermo-suit did what little it could to repel the coldness that seeped into her bones.

She glared at the edge of the lake where she recognized Finn and Poe had probably come to save her. A deep sense of humiliation and failure washed over her, those two feelings combining into one another and turning into anger.

Anger towards herself.

She wasn’t good enough. Maybe Rey had never been good enough. How could she defeat–

Whispers filled her ears; no, her very mind.

Rey braced herself as the realization dawned: she was having a vision.

_The snowy planet around her faded. And if she felt that Kashyyk was quiet, the deadly silence that accompanied the darkness was near unbearable. An image sprang into her mind: she was inside a temple._

_In front of her, a young couple knelt before the hologram of Supreme Leader Snoke, their heads bowed in respect. And behind them, a mangled body floated within a tank filled with yellowish slime; wires and tubes were attached to the withering corpse. Suddenly, the woman snapped her head up. Horror etched on her lovely features at whatever Snoke had said._

_Rey could only flinch as the vision shifted to that of the young couple fleeing the temple, a little girl in the woman’s arms. And Rey could see them, the familiar three buns of hair on the back of the woman’s head._

_Rey didn’t notice that she had started crying, the hot angry tears flowing freely as the vision changed yet again, to that of a desert. She saw herself, small and terrified as she screamed for her parents to come back; to not leave her on the desolate harsh landscape, the wasteland of the Jakku desert. The hair on the nape of her neck stood up, she heard a scream. Her mother’s scream. Rey smelled her blood but she couldn’t see her._

_She couldn’t see how her mother_ died _._

Rey couldn’t see anything, not Finn and Poe already swimming towards her, not Leia’s personal transport touching down near base. All she could see was red, a loud wail slipping through her lips.

A massive shockwave of sheer Force power rippled out of Rey, sending everybody around her flying backwards. Finn and Poe struggled against its strength but Leia was knocked down and everybody within base were visibly confused once they recovered from it. Rey blinked, shocked and distressed.

The vision evaporated as quick as it appeared.

“I’m sorry.” Was all Rey could whisper once Finn and Poe reached hertaking hold of her and pulling her towards shore; none of them thinking about the coldness they felt.

“I’m sorry.” Was all Rey could whisper when she saw Leia rush towards her, a worried look on her face.

Everything was a blur, her body not used to the cold temperatures went into shock. Poe quickly enveloped her in his disregarded jacket and Finn scooped her up in his arms, carrying her towards the base with determined strides.

“I’m sorry.” Was all Rey could whisper when they reached her room and doctor Kalonia shoved a medicine-filled syringe into her thigh after somebody had stripped Rey to her underwear.

Rey was severely disoriented, she couldn’t even focus her eyes on who the warm hand that was caressing her face belonged to. Somebody whispered something in her ear, but she lost all consciousness before she could figure out what they were saying.

*** * ***

Far from the known planes of time and space.

In a place that served as both a gateway and a prison, a lone sinister figure smiled.


	6. Death's old friend

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Death. Nothing graphic, just thought I should do a heads up if somebody isn't comfortable with eh topic. Please read accordingly!

Rey woke up with a splitting headache and a runny nose.

She blinked groggily, recognizing her little hut. Rey winced as she noticed the syringe that carried a purple fluid punctured into her right arm.

“You gave us quite the scare.” Leia spoke up from where she sat by the foot of Rey’s bed, her expression soft but her voice serious. “Determination, is not the same as readiness.” She scolded

“I know.” Rey croaked, her throat feeling raw and dry. Leia immediately rushed to her side, handing her the cup of water that was placed on her bedside table. Rey gulped down the water greedily, her throat feeling much better instantly. Leia let out a tired breath after Rey was done drinking the cup empty. Rey too, let out a breath.

It was decision time.

She shouldn’t keep the dark vision she had seen to herself. But Rey hesitated. Because although Leia was way more understanding and lenient than Luke had ever been, the Skywalker twins were afraid of the Dark Side. And that was a deep rooted fear that stemmed from their family’s complicated history. A fear Ben had ignored completely. Nonetheless, Rey made up her mind quickly. “I had a vision.” She spoke up, catching Leia’s attention.

“What was it about?” Leia gently implored, her brown eyes wide with surprise.

So Rey told the General everything she had seen, trying not to forget a single detail for it might be important. After all, even if Leia was not a proper Jedi, she still had far more experience with the Force than Rey did. In the middle of Rey trying to explain what she had seen, doctor Kalonia knocked on the door. She quickly went about her business in checking Rey’s vital signs and adjusted the IV that was protruding from the skin on her left forearm. Ushering Rose in afterwards, who came bearing a bowl of bone broth. She handed it over to Rey with a kind smile and left without interrupting Rey’s retelling.

“Thank you for sharing this with me.” Leia told Rey truthfully after Rey had finished her tale, eying Rey amusedly as she hungrily shoveled some of Chewie’s warm broth into her mouth; not waiting for it to cool. 

Rey shook her head. “It felt…different than other visions I’ve had.” She drawled in between spoonfuls. How could she describe something so intense and personal?

“How so?” Leia prompted, a strange expression on her face. But words failed Rey. Because she didn’t actually know. She just felt it. This vision was different because it felt dark. And that frightened Rey, becase she was sure she had seen her parents. Kylo had said that her parents were drunks who sold her off for drinking money. Could itbe that they had been part of the First Order before they relocated to Jakku? And if so, what had Snoke said that prompted them to leave? At Rey’s silence, Leia looked at her sadly and spoke: “Rey, there’s something I need to tell you.”

Rey stopped eating noisily and looked at the General. But before Leia could say something else, they heard it. The unmistakable shrieking sound of TIE fighters flying overhead.

“They’ve found us.” Leia said.

*** * ***

It had all happened so suddenly. The TIE fighters swooped in out of nowhere.

Rey –still weak– yanked the IV out of her arm with a hiss and grabbed her emergency pack, hurriedly taking hold of Leia’s hand before making their way into the hallway. The base was thrown into chaos as everyone within tried to escape the attack. And the Resistance wasn’t being quick enough.

From where they were standing, they could see a transport filled with stormtroopers making planetfall and all they could do was scramble towards safety as the always battle ready Mandalorian’s who had escorted Leia, covered their retreat.

“Get out of here!” Bo-Katan shouted in her helmet-modulated voice, her arms outstretched as her vambraces let out another round of rapid-fire whistling birds towards the incoming troopers. “We’ll hold them off!” She assured Leia and Rey with a nod. Who quickly lost track of the older woman amongst the Mandalorians once they engaged the First Order’s troopers in battle.

Rey can’t think of anything as the instincts of survival from all of her years on Jakku kicked in. She ignored the blood trickling down her forearm, guiding Leia towards one of the emergency passages she knew led to the landing pad on the other side of a great wroshyr tree where the Millenium Falcon was waiting for them. Her feet faltered when her eyes become dotted with black spots, her headache returning in full force.

“Chewie!” Leia yells towards the passing Wookie. “Get her to the Falcon, I’ll meet you there!” She instructed with severity. Rey muttered a slurred objection. “It’s alright. We’ll see each other again, Rey.”

Rey was getting tired of being thrown around like a sack of spare bolts she realized when Chewie lifted her up, carrying towards the Falcon like she weighed nothing.

Rey should have stopped Leia from going back. She should have dragged her and taken her to safety aboard the Falcon.

She should have done _something_.

But she didn’t and now, Rey could barely feel her faint but constant Force signature as the Falcon zipped through the stars and the battle faded away behind them. Her vision had cleared once more and the blood that trickled down her arm had long since dried.

“Anybody has eyes on the General?” She asks through the commlink, her vision clearing gradually while they cruised through hyperspace; sharing a worried glance with Chewie.

“She’s in our transport.” Came the voice of Rose after a moment of silence. Rey let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding in. “Rey…The General was shot. She– she’s very weak.” Rose said in a hushed voice, barely a whisper. “They don’t know if she’ll make it. We still have 10 hours to go before we reach Ajan Kloss.”

Rey couldn’t respond. This was her fault after all. Her stomach dropped and bile rose in her throat as she rests her head on the pilot seat of the Falcon, eyes trained at the passing stars that bathed the cockpit in a blue hue.

Chewie whined at her.

“I’m fine.” Rey lied though her teeth; knowing full well she was anything but. The Wookie growls at her. Rey weakly turned her head to face him. His blue eyes belying the frustration and helplessness he felt. He was scared. For the General and for her.

Rey sighed as she stood up slowly. “I’ll only sleep for a while, then we can shift.” She told him sternly, flashing him a small smile; waiting for him nod in agreement. She left Chewie in the cockpit and walked towards the crew quarters, grabbing on to the wall; her head feeling light.

* * *

Ajan Kloss, the lush rain forest moon on the Cademimu Sector in the Outer Rim was teeming with life.

If it were any other time, Rey would be absolutely gawking at everything and anything that crawled, ran or trotted on the jungle floor. But today was different. The Resistance was just moving into the ancient Rebel base; except no one was thinking about that when their most beloved general was all but bleeding on the hangar floor as they carried her on a medical cot. Finn on the head and Snap on the feet, Poe shouting for everybody to make way.

Death was not an uncommon concept for Rey. On Jakku, she was often mesmerized by the passing of time etched on people’s faces. One couldn’t always tell on some of the beings that dwelled on Niima Outpost, but the humanoids were easy enough to tell; their faces told the story of the harsh climate of the desert planet. No matter how many cloths you wrapped your head and face, the sun beat you to it; the freckles that dotted Rey’s face a testament to that truth. Rey often wondered if that was her future, to live a life of bone and skin so thin she would have wrinkles within her wrinkles.

But Rey couldn’t even describe what she was feeling at seeing Leia so ghastly pale, her face in a scowl of pain and her hand clutching her side, where she had bled through the haphazardly placed gauze. She followed closely behind with Chewie, her small hand clasped in his large, furry one. They followed to the hospital wing where Doctor Kalonia urged everybody to wait outside.

It seemed like the hours were blurring together. Finn had fallen asleep with his head on Rose’s lap, Poe was busy whispering with a solemn look on his face with D’Acy and Connix, Chewie would have dug himself to the ground from all the pacing he was doing. Rey could do nothing but bite her lip so hard she drew blood several times.

As the day turned into night, one by one most people were called into the General’s room. First it was Poe, then the higher ups like Finn and Rose, then they all exited so that Threepio and R2-D2 could enter; both bickering as to who should enter first. Then it was time for Chewie, who after an hour asked for Rey to enter the room. Rey got up and walked hesitantly inside, sweaty hands clenched nervously at her sides.

Rey supposed she had never seen Leia look so…defeated; not even when they were actually loosing a battle like the one on Crait. The General had always seemed larger than life since Rey had met her, a living legend of wars far before her time in the Resistance. Leia looked her older age, laying on the medical wing bed; her eyes almost unfocused and her mouth moving as she mumbled about something or the other.

“Rey,” Leia said quietly, her head turning to the door. “Come closer.” She beckoned. Rey was light on her feet, barely making a sound as she tiptoed towards the General; grabbing the outstretched hand Leia offered. “There’s so much I want to tell you, dear one.”

“Save your strength.” Rey pleaded with her, clasping the General’s hand firmly; maybe even desperately. “We need you.”

Leia shook her head. “Death is inevitable, Rey.” She smiled bittersweetly, patting Rey’s hand. “There is one final lesson left,” She gulped. Rey nodded, of course. Anything. “But this one, you must teach me.” Rey frowned at this.

“W-what could _I_ teach you?”

“Help me reach Ben.” Leia implored, her eyes shining with such sorrow. “Please.”

Rey nodded, she didn’t know when she had started to cry. “I don’t know how but…Luke told me to reach out with my feelings.” Rey tried to explain. “I think that if you concentrate, you may be able to sense him through the Force.” Rey didn’t know what else to say, didn’t even know if she was making any sense.

But it seemed that it was enough for Leia. Who seemed to stare at Rey’s face with a fond smile. “You’re such a bright young woman,” Leia croaked. “Rey…never be afraid of who you are.” Leia spoke with candor, making Rey tear up at her words. She knew that Leia spoke from the heart, for Leia had confided in her how hard it had been to reconcile her identity as Vader’s daughter. She understood what Rey felt after her vision. “I love you like a daughter, Rey…I- I hope you know that.” Rey was at a loss for words now, a small strangled sob passing her lips.

“I-I love you too,” Rey told her quietly, it was the first time in her life that she had said those words out loud.“Thank you.” Rey had always wanted to have a family. To belong. And that was what she had unknowingly found the day she crossed paths with BB-8.

Leia smiled at her fully this time and her eyes were also filled with unshed tears. She breathed in deeply, turning to face the window where the moons were shining their light into the room. “Don’t give up on him. I-I never gave up hope for him.” She said so softly and quietly, Rey thought for a split second she hadn’t heard anything at all. “Han and I…we loved him so much. But love isn’t enough, there’s…We failed him.”

Rey shuddered. Remembering what she had told Luke after confronting him. She saw now that perhaps they had all failed him by placing these larger than life expectations on Ben. “Then tell him.” She tells Leia earnestly.

Leia nodded at this and she let out a sigh that sounded to Rey’s ears like relief. “I’d like to be alone now, please.” Rey gulped, leaning in and placing a kiss on her Master’s forehead. “Goodbye, dear one.”

“Goodbye…Leia.”

Rey was almost to the door when the General spoke once more: “Rey,” She turned to face the Princess-turned-General once more. “May the Force be with you…always.”

*** * ***

From where she was lying down, Leia let the moonlight bring back all of the memories that made her life all the much better.

Her mother and father running after her in the gardens of the Royal Palace on Alderaan. Meeting a purple haired girl that would inspire her time and time again to hope. Dancing under the stars on the forrest moon of Endor with her brother and her love. Holding her tiny son in her arms, with his unruly black hair and bright intelligent eyes. The way he cried until Han or Chewie held him close the first few months after he had been born. Leia sighed with a heavy realization, the effort to reach Ben would take everything she had left.

_Leia._

I’m not looking forward to spending an eternity with you– she thought. You really do have lazy timing.

_A Jedi is always punctual._

Leia humored him, opting to remain quiet instead of reminding him that he had the worst timing; rivaling Han Solo himself. It was hard to let go, this fight and these people, were the things she loved. Yet it wasn’t so hard after she remembered the ones she was leaving behind. Poe,her protégée who was more than capable of fanning the tiny spark of hope within the Resistance and the galaxy; this was something her father Bail had taught her. Rey, who was so afraid of the darkness that simmered within her. The girl was the galaxy’s last hope. And Ben, oh her Ben. If Vader could turn once more to Anakin Skywalker, not all hope was lost for Kylo Ren. Her son was forever temper by the light, Rey could sense it and so could she.

_Leia_ , Luke prompted. Leia rolled her eyes at this. When did he get so bossy? So that’s how it would be. A final act of hope.

Leia closed her eyes, reaching for the Force. She let it surround her and fill her. It wasn’t as exhausting like she thought it would be. It felt like coming home. Leia reached deeper within her than she ever had with Luke. She reached out like Rey had instructed her to do. Reached out with all of her life, hope, love and forgiveness in her being.

There.

Leia could feel Ben, so far way. Millions and millions of lightyears away from her. “Ben.” She smiled.

The Force welcomed her with a warmth that reminded her of the sun that had once kissed her son’s face in an apartment on Chandrila, her brother’s golden hair and her husband’s radiant smile.

*** * ***

“Kylo?”

Kylo couldn’t make sense of what Kuruk was saying to him, his gaze suddenly distant and his lips parted. Through the Force came a mighty current, as if the tide had swept him away into sea. Kylo Ren stumbled, an incomparable emptiness rippling through his very soul. Kuruk and Ap’lek were quick to hold on to their master as he collapsed– staring up at the sky in agony and confusion, his chest heaving.

His mother had reached out to him for the first time in years.

And now, she was gone.

*** * ***

Finn held her hand throughout the funeral, noticing her bright eyes dim as Poe –the new Resistance General– spoke a few words in the late Generals’ honor. Rey didn’t really listen to what he had said, something about bravery, loyalty and stubbornness till the end. Which summed up Leia Organa very well. When he asked her if she wanted to speak, she replied with a weak shake of her head.

She had nothing to say.

And if Rey opened her mouth, she wasn’t entirely sure if she was capable of speech. Everyone at the base stood around the funeral pyre, paying their respects to the most loved general.

Rey remained as they lit up the torches around the closed casket, lowering it to the ground. She remained as one by one, members of the Resistance retreated into the jungle and back to the base. She remained stoically as her eyes dried out from the heat of the flames in front of her. She remained even when her friends whispered to her that they were going to head back with the others and Finn gently let go of her hand.

R2-D2 beeped at her side sadly. “You were her loyal friend until the end Artoo.” Rey sniffed, turning her head away from the Astromech Droid who slid away with a sad whir. She remained the lone figure on the clearing as the stars came out and she was bathed in pale moonlight.

And when she felt the world around her going oddly quiet, she welcomed it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a few problems uploading this one, so I'll come back tomorrow to tweak it a bit. As always thank u to my wonderful Beta. Hope u all liked this chapter. Kudos, comments and shares are always a good surprise.


	7. Reap what you sow

Rey wasn’t going to speak first.

For all the blame she put on herself, this was his burden too.

She wasn’t even going to look at him even though she felt his eyes burn holes at her profile. His sadness radiated out of him like waves; engulfing her in a deep melancholy of memories she knew weren’t hers but shared through their unusual bond.

Chubby fingers caressing a beautiful young woman’s smiling face. A quiet soothing voice singing a lullaby in the dark. The same woman in the reflection of a mirror, her eyes shut contently as a gangly dark-haired boy no older than thirteen carefully undid the intricate braids that rested atop her head. They weren’t his either. These memories belonged to a man long gone.

“What happened?” He finally asks her, his voice coming out as a rasp. Rey sucked in a deep breath.

“I should ask you that.” Rey quips tartly with her eyes still set on the now dwindling embers of the funeral pyre. “It was your men who did it, _Supreme Leader_.” She stated simply, relishing the way he sucked in a breath at her use of his title. Good.

“Rey, _don’t_.” He all but begged. She turned to look at him now.

His usually well-groomed hair was a mess, probably from running his fingers through it too many times. His eyes looked tired and bloodshot, the bags under them highlighting the fact that he probably hadn’t been sleeping for a long while now. And his full lips quivered. Kylo Ren looked to be quite frank, terrible.

“We were ambushed. She was shot.” Rey averted her eyes, choosing to look at the night sky instead. Those eyes sending a pang of worry straight to her heart. “She held on for as long as she could. But she was never the same after that attack on _The Raddus_.” She bit out, Kylo wincing at the mention of this. Rey hadn’t been there, but she had been told that him and two other TIE fighters were responsible for the onslaught. “This was your fault.”

Rey was being cruel. She knew this. But couldn’t find it in her to care. Not right now. Not when he had chosen this life of suffering and death.

“I- I wasn’t the one who gave the order.” He confesses quietly. This informationsurprises Rey. Making her turn back to him with incredulous eyes. “I wasn’t aboard _The Steadfast_ when it happened. It was Hux.” He muttered, venom lacing his words. His hatred for the man shining through.

“And where were you?” She asks him indignantly, her anger bubbling from within and rising to the surface. “Where were you when that _bastard_ gave the order to attack? To kill your own mother?” Rey snarled, teeth bared and eyes flashing. “Where was the all mighty Supreme Leader Kylo Ren?!” She raged, seeing red and a darkness within reveling in it. “ _Where were you_?!” Rey lifted her fisted hands and started to beat them against his chest. He remained in silence, letting her work through her fury; silent tears streaming down his own face.

“Coruscant.” Kylo admitted simply with a sniff. “The Knights and I were– never-mind.” He mumbled bitterly. “I never should have left things in Hux’s hands.” If she asked why he was doing in the cosmopolitan planet, he most likely wouldn’t answer her. But she could sense he wasn’t lying. Some of the rage inside her, cooled at this. He had been planet side and he definitely regretted that fact. “Naboo.” He says suddenly, his eyes faraway in thought.

“What?” Rey blurted out.

“She wanted her funeral to be on Naboo.” He clarifies. “We spoke about it…once.” For someone who said he wanted to let the past die, he couldn’t seem to stop clinging to memories of his past life.

“We’re very far away from Naboo.” Stupid. Why in the seven hells would she say something like that to her enemy? Might as well give him their location. He made no comment on the matter. It was awfully quiet. “Why Naboo?” She asked hesitantly. For all she knew, General Leia’s homeworld had been Alderaan. And the planet had been destroyed by the Empire years ago.

Kylo contemplated the question. His face indicating that he wasn’t sure whether or not to answer it. “Her birth mother was from Naboo.” He settles on. Rey had forgotten that part of the Skywalker story Leia had told her. How the twins had been separated at birth to protect them from Darth Vader. Yet in every retelling of the story, people seemed to forget to talk about their mother. She frowned, the beginning of a question forming on her lips but he interrupts her quietly: “It’s complicated.”

“Did you…did you feel it?” She asks stupidly. _Of course he did, he came out of her womb, Rey_. Kylo nods, his jaw clenching and eyes turning glossy. “I felt it too.” She mumbles.

He opened his mouth to say something but clenched it shut. Then, deciding better on it, he opens his mouth once more: “There’s something I need to tell you.” He confessed, his eyes scanning her face. “I had a vision on Mustafar.” Rey wants to roll her eyes at this.

Last time she trusted a vision, she had foolishly sent herself to the open arms of the First Order. And look how well that turned out. Still, Rey wondered if it was a good idea to tell him of her own vision.

“Don’t look at me like that.” Kylo scowled, noticing the scrunch of her nose. “Something’s coming. It’s bigger than this fight between the First Order and the Resistance.” He gulps.

“You’re talking about the message from Palpatine.” Rey frowns, yet her mouth parts in surprise. “You know something.”

He nods, eyes weary. “He has an entire fleet of Star Destroyers filled with a Sith army all loyal to him.”

“Leia said the Sith were gone.” She frowned.

“Technically, they are. But their followers call themselves the Sith Eternal who– Look I can’t exactly explain the details!” He rolls his eyes impatiently at the incredulous look on her face. “We don’t know what kind of weapons those Star Destroyers are equipped with. The Eternals are a cult who have been rumored to meddle in dark science from ancient Sith Holocrons.”

“Why should I trust anything you say?” She scoffs. He does seem visibly shaken by whatever he had seen, he clung to the dark but he was still, at his core a creature of the light. Even if he wouldn’t admit to it.

“I’ve never lied to you, Rey.” Came his answer. Rey wanted to say more– but she heard rustling coming from the jungle. Hand on Luke’s saber, she’s ready to face any threat. Instead, she turns to find Finn walking towards her with a lantern in hand.

“Poe said no one’s allowed out at night until the perimeter is secure.” Finn explains apologetically. Rey looks back to where Kylo was standing. Only to find that the Force Bond had been cut off.

How convenient.

“I was just heading back.” Rey nods in agreement as she walked towards him with a sheepish look on her face.

The jungle planet was hot, Rey noted while they walked in comfortable silence. But not hot like Jakku was hot. This was humid and much worse in her opinion. She could already feel the beads of sweat forming on her brow.

“Hey, Rey?” Finn spoke up, earning a hum from her. “Poe also wanted to ask you if you’d like to be part of a counterattack mission. We’re quite close to Ord Mantell, the First Order’s got a _deepdock_ there.”

Rey bit her lip in thought. Revenge was not the Jedi way. She read it clear as day in one of the ancient texts Threepio had been helping her decipher. No matter how much she itched to jump aboard the Falcon, being a Jedi meant keeping her worst impulses in check.

“You don’t have to answer right now of course.” Finn added quickly as they neared the base, the lights guiding them. “I’m sure he’ll ask you soon enough. I just wanted to give you a heads up. Y’know so you can think about it.”

Rey gave him a small smile. “I’ll think about it.” She promises, they parted ways in the corridors that led towards the women’s dormitory.

The quarters she had been assigned to where no different than all the other Resistance bases she had been in. Standard issue. She made sure of it after they had once tried to put her in a dormitory made for a higher official and she’d profoundly refused the special treatment.

She took off her boots and socks with a grunt, chucking them beneath the bed. Rey quickly stripped and changed into her pijamas, deciding that she was going to sleep atop the covers because Rosehadn’t quite been able to figure out how to turn on the air conditioning and so the only source of cool in the room came from the sole open window.

The cool night breeze filtered into the room as she took out her hair from the hairstyle Connix had taught her for the funeral, massaging her scalp in the process. When she rested her head on the pillow, it wasn’t hard for her to be lulled to sleep by the sounds of the jungle coming alive at night.

Falling into a restless slumber where her dreams were plagued by dark figures.

*** * ***

General Hux strode down one of the back corridors of the Citadel in Coruscant’s Galactic City.

After Ren and his savages had commanded the siege on Galactic City, all of the planet fell into the First Order’s grasp. It had been a quick battle, as most of the citizens within the wealthier upper levels of the cosmopolitan planet fell into the category of what Ren had called ‘ _bootlickers and kiss-asses_ ’. Despite the hideous terms used, Hux had to admit –begrudgingly– that the mongrel was right.

He had never seen such spineless society as that of the frivolous Coruscanti who agreed to become part of the First Order in return to keep their liberties that had been taken away from them in the days of the Empire’s rule.

The lower levels of the underworld on the other hand, were becoming a nuisance. Some of the higher ranking officials who were not in HighCommand had to be stationed in different sectors and the ever present Knights of Ren were called in when situations needed… _violence_. Hux loathed the Knights. He hated them even more because he couldn’t see their faces that hid behind their masks not unlike the one Kylo Ren had once worn. Perhaps they had something to hide.

He hoped their faces were hideous and scarred beyond recognition.

“Sir!” Tishra Kandia hurried towards him.

Kandia was a top intelligence officer. She was one of the few on Ren’s personal team who never doubted his commands. Hux admitted that he had the slight suspicion that the woman was infatuated with the young Supreme Leader. This idea was even more cemented in his mind, when he had sought her out for information against the scavenger girl from Jakku and she was all too ready to act. For everybody in High Command knew that Kylo Ren was most definitely obsessed with finding the scavenger called Rey, sparing the First Order’s resources freely at every chance he had.

“I was finally able to track down the surveillance footage from the Supremacy’s wreckage.” She triumphantly informs him, finally catching up to him.

“Excellent work, Kandia!” Hux approves with what he hopes is a welcoming smile after stopping and turning around to face her. Kandia takes out a small data stick from her pocket and offers it to him. Hux takes it gleefully. “This of course, goes without saying. But your discretion is much appreciated.”

Kandia in turn salutes him and Hux would be lying to himself if he didn’t admit that the mere act of somebody paying their respects –obeying _his_ orders– sent a jolt of satisfaction down his spine. “Certainly, sir.” And with that, she walked away to her actual duties.

Leaving a beaming Hux to stare wondrously at the small datastick in his hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Sorry if I haven't been consistent with the updates, I just finished my first semester of university so hopefully things will get a rhythm for a long while <3\. As always, many thanks to my wonderful Beta. Oh and you're getting a double update today :) 
> 
> Kudos, comments and shares will FOREVER be appreciated <3


	8. How's your scar?

“Rey!” Rose called out from across the mess-hall. “Come sit over here!” She enthusiastically waved to her. Rey walked over to the table where the gang was seated, sans Poe and Snap.

“They’re at the command center.” Connix supplies in between bites of her buttered toast. “They’ve been at it since yesterday night. Planning up tactics and what not. I had to get away.” She shrugs. Rey nods understandingly, tucking in at her porridge hungrily.

“Yeah whenever Poe and Snap start talking pilot stuff, you’ve lost them.” Finn chuckles, Connix agreeing with him. “Besides, the whole Palpatine thing has him really on edge.”

“Can you blame him?” Connix sympathized through bites of her buttered toast. “Imagine someone coming _back_ from the _dead_ and that someone being a totally creepy Sith Lord who ruled the entire galaxy at one point.” She whisper yells, so as to not be overheard by everybody else in the mess hall.

Finn nods as Rey, who was oblivious to table manners asks with her mouth full: “Any word on the Mandalorians?”

Finn shakes his head. “They went into hiding last I heard, Poe thinks they might be in the Concord Dawn system. You shouldn’t worry. The Mandalorians are probably the toughest people in the galaxy.”

“I’m worried about Chewie.” Rose pipes up, her gaze staring sadly behind Rey’s shoulder. “He hasn’t been speaking to anyone since the General’s death and he eats all of his meals alone in the hangar.” She explained.

Rey ventured a glance backwards to where the Wookie in question looked comically out of place waiting in line for his food to be served. “Of course he’s sad.” Finn sighed. “This is the second time Kylo Ren kills one if his friends.” He muttered angrily.

“Finn!” Rose chastised, hurriedly looking over to Rey who remained quiet at the comment, eyesfixed on the bowl of grey oats in front of her. They didn’t know. Couldn’t have known about the bond. However they did know she was close to the General and to Han Solo. Only Finn knew who Kylo Ren truly was. But he couldn’t be bothered with an ounce of pity for the man after being gutted like a fish by him, no matter who his parents were.

“I’m sorry.” He mumbles, a pink tinge rushing to his cheeks. “Too soon.”

Rey’s chair scraped the floor as she quickly got up. “I’m going to go check on Chewie.” She announced, picking up her tray with food.

“But you haven’t finished your breakfast yet.” Rose notes lamely, hoping she’d stay.

“I’ve lost my appetite.” Rey muttered, turning around and emptying the tray in the trash, placing the now empty tray on top of a maintenance droid. She walked out of the mess hall despite hearing Rose and Connix whisper yell at Finn to go after her and apologize.

*** * ***

The hangar was relatively empty and it wasn’t hard to find Chewie who was sitting on some crates, stuffing his face with porridge. He wiped his mouth when he saw her coming. Yowling a welcome that didn’t quite boom like it used to. The Porg stowaway he affectionately called Ro chirping at her from where he was perched beside the large Wookie.

“Hello.” Rey greets them with a shy smile. “I heard you ate here.” She said, scratching the Porg’s protruding little belly. Chewie groaned. “Yes, I’m sure you’re very busy.” She concedes, if only for his sake. Because even if the Falcon always seemed to be falling apart, Rose had checked it and it was fine.

“You know, I’m not good at…talking. Sometimes I talk too much or say too little.” Rey clears her throat, looking at Chewie intently. “But I am a good listener. And if you needed to…talk…to someone.” For a lack of a better word to the grunts and growls that made of Chewbacca’s native language of Shyriiwook. “You can count on me.” She tells him sincerely.

Chewie gives her a small grin, growling his thanks.

Rey nods contently, waiting for a second hoping that he’d start talking. But he didn’t. He just stared at her with those blue eyes that had seen so much suffering over his hundreds of years alive. “If you need me,” She sighs. “You know where to find me.” Chewie nods at this. She flashes him another smile and started her retreat out of the hangar, but something in her made her want to say something more. And so she did.

“He wasn’t the one who called the attack.” Rey gulps nervously, stopping in her tracks. Chewie was quiet for a moment, both of them knowing precisely to whom she was referring to. The Wookie growled angrily at her, his eyes squinting at her suspiciously.

“I just know.” She answers simply, resuming her walk out the hangar.

*** * ***

Working with Threepio was…a challenge.

Growing up alone in Jakku, Rey didn’t have a lot of people to talk to. Which was why at first, she had to get used to people actually wanting to have a conversation with her when she joined the Resistance. It was a harsh reminder that she wasn’t alone now. And being around people meant having all sorts of different conversations.

With Finn, she could talk about anything and everything. With Poe, she talked about ships. With Rose, she talked about girly stuff like hairstyles just as much as they geeked out over fixing the Millennium Falcon with Chewie. And with Leia, she had talked about the Force, Luke, Han and sometimes even Ben.

But Threepio wouldn’t stop talking.Ever.

Even though she had wanted his help at translating the ancient Jedi texts, she quickly found out he couldn’t shut up– literally couldn’t. R2-D2 wasn’t joking when he had said that she would want to move to a different star system after an hour with Threepio for company. More often than not, she would grab one of the old books and scurry off into the jungle for some peace and quiet. This was one of those days.

She was trying out the different forms for combat on the page she was reading– a wooden stick acting as her lightsaber, when the bond activated.

“Why do you continue to study those things?” Kylo asks her, appearing to her sitting on a nearby root of a big tree with a datapad in hand. “There’s only so much you can learn from ghosts.” Rey chose to ignore him and continued to move through the forms. “You’re doing them wrong.” He adds with a bored look on his face.

“And how would _you_ know?” She huffs in frustration, still not looking at him.

“May I remind you who my uncle was?” Kylo scoffed with a pointed look, earning him a roll of her eyes. “You’re trying to do some sort of _Soresu_ form when you don’t even use _Shii-Cho_ when fighting. Which is the first one you learn.”

Rey stopped her movements. She looked at him in annoyance. She had no idea what he was talking about and it showed on her face.

“Look, since you didn’t start your training with a lightsaber properly,” He started explaining with a sigh, lowering the datapad to his lap. “You don’t actually use any established forms or fighting styles. You fight on instinct.” Kylo finishes with a shrug. “Sloppily.” He adds as an afterthought.

“Yeah?” She laughed humorlessly. “How’s your scar?” Rey bit out, she’d bested him once. She was sure she could do it again if it came down to it.

“I never said you didn’t do it _effectively._ ” Kylo concedes with a grunt, an eyebrow raised amusedly at her petty remark. He hadn’t meant to be rude. He was just a brute when it came to complimenting her it would seem, If one would consider them as such of course, not that Rey _did_ anyway. “What I’m trying to say is that you don’t really need to learn a fighting style.”

“And what do you suggest?” Rey deadpans, hands on her hips.

“For a start, you should try training with an actual saber.” Kylo snarks, a small smirk forming on his full lips as he gazes pointedly to the stick in her hand.

Rey’s cheeks went pink. She hand’t gotten around to fixing Luke’s saber properly, primarily because she didn’t even know if it was fixable. The Jedi texts had offered some guidance but not enough. So she’d just tried to weld the broken pieces back to one. Resulting in Rey burning her hands off almost every time she turned it on.

But he didn’t need to know that.

“And maybe try learning certain moves you can implement into your own fighting style. As opposed to learning a whole form.” He counseled.

Rey frowned. “Aren’t you supposed to try and stop me from being better?” She asked, puzzled yet again. For all accounts they were enemies, no matter their compromising difficult history together.

“Rey, I have _literally_ told you that there is a Sith cult out there with an entire fleet. If anything, you should be preparing yourself for one hell of a fight.” Kylo remarks.

Rey’s gaze drops to the datapad in his hand. “Leia, was helping me train.” She admits quietly.

Kylo blinks at this, a look Rey cannot read passes his face. “I offered to teach you on Starkiller. And then I offered you my hand,” He stated softly, as if it wounded him that Rey had agreed to be trained by all of his family except him. “You wanted to take it. Why didn’t you?” Kylo asks in a maddeningly calm voice that Rey loathed when he used.

She doesn’t deny it. “You could have killed me.” Rey counters instead. “Why didn’t you?”

“Contrary to popular belief Rey, I have no desire to kill you.” He enunciated softly.

“Yet.” Rey bit out, challenging him. But he didn’t take the bait. Kylo merely smirked at her, that amused look on his face returning. He turned to look at something on his side of the bond and then he was gone in the blink of an eye.

Rey huffed, walking back to where she had left the _Aionomica_ , throwing the stupid wooden stick on the jungle floor. She hated to admit it, but he was right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Double chapter! Hooray! See u next Sunday for our regular posting schedule <3
> 
> Kudos, comments and shares are always appreciated :)


	9. The Lightsaber

Rose greeted her with a kind smile when she walked into her workshop, pushing her safety goggles onto the top of her head and hopping off from the little stool she used when examining ship’s parts and blasters. “Hi.” She greeted cheerfully.

Rey flashed her a smile in greeting. “I was wondering if you could help me with something. But I can come back if you’re too busy.” She motions toward the _lateral stabilizer_ Rose was fixing.

“No, this isn’t urgent.” Rose shook her head, taking off her rather large gloves. “Shoot.”

Rey placed the haphazardly patched up lightsaber she had carefully wrapped in cloth on her work table. Rose hesitantly slid the cloth towards her, glancing back at Rey who only nodded. She picked it up and examined Rey’s handy work. “I didn’t know how to fix it properly.” Rey admits with a self-conscious cough, scratching behind her ear awkwardly.

“So you tried to glue it back together basically.” Rose remarked, changing her safety goggles for her seeing ones, making her dark eyes appear huge behind the lenses.

“Basically.” Rey agrees sheepishly. “But I was wondering, if the kyber crystal–” Paused when she looked at Rose who had a puzzled look on her face. “The thing that powers the blade and gives it its color was broken in two. Could I maybe repurpose it? Like instead of trying to use it as a whole…maybe use it as two?”

“As in two lightsabers?” Rose mused out loud, the woman’s brilliant mind already thinking in how to fix this problem.

“Or a double bladed one.” Rey offered with a small smile.

Rose’s eyes widened, taking off her seeing goggles. “Like your staff!” Rose exclaims with a beaming smile on her face. Rey had thought about it for a while. If she was good with a normal lightsaber, she’d be even better with a quarterstaff-like in her hand. Familiar and hefty. “That’s brilliant Rey! I can get started on it right away!” She said giddily.

“Actually, there’s a ceremony in which I have to meditate to build the lightsaber. Y’know with the Force.” Rey explains and Rose nods understandingly. Out of all of her friends, Rose was the one who was the most patient with Rey’s ‘Jedi shenanigans’ as Finn and Poe called them; which basically meant when Rey sometimes talked a lot about the Force in ways that not even she sometimes understood fully.

“Oh so you only want the parts?” Rose guesses, still assessing the lightsaber. “Well then, I’ll need to know what you need.”

Rey took out from her back pocket a drawing she had made from one of the texts and unfolded it before handing it to Rose. “I tried to draw everything accurately.” She confessed.

“This’ll work fine.” Rose waves her off. “I’ll just use the parts from this blade and your old staff.”

“I know this is a bit complicated.” Rey winces.

“It’s fine. I love a good challenge!” Rose told her, her dimpled smile endearing Rey. “If I can work on it now, I can have the parts ready by tomorrow.”

“I owe you one.” Rey admits truthfully, a sigh of relief coming from her lips.

Rose shrugged. “That’s what friends are for.” She smiled at Rey, who smiled back. “Although, if you helped me…maybe we can have it done even faster.” She wiggled her eyebrows.

Rey jokingly flexed her muscles. “Let’s do this then.”

Rey and Rose worked side by side on the lightsaber for hours. First, they dismantled Rey’s poor attempt at fixing it. Rose making some notes on how the cracked kyber crystal was housed and every detail she deemed important. Rey started to disassemble her old quarterstaff. Sometimes one of them would curse out loud from accidentally electrocuting, cutting or burning themselves. Other times they would groan when their backs got too tired; rolling their shoulders to try and release some of the built-up tension.

When they were finished, they carefully laid all of the parts on the floor of the room.

“I’ll leave you to your uh– _Jedi things._ ” Rose yawned quietly, squeezing Rey’s shoulder supportively as she passed her on her way out. “I’ll be outside just in case you need anything.” She calls out reassuringly, closing the door behind her.

Rey sat down in front of the parts, crossing her legs and placing her hands on her knees. _I can do this_ , she assured herself when she closed her eyes.

Focus Rey.

She could see herself besting Kylo with this saber, proving to him that she was a competent worthy opponent even though she had nobody to teach her like he had. Rey imagined herself wielding that weapon into battle.

She opened her eyes, the parts hadn’t moved one inch. The world went quiet around her, but she pushed his nosy presence out. She didn’t want him to distract her.

“Not now.” She hisses in frustration, hoping that he would hear her and take a hint hint. He had, his presence slowly easing out of her mind. The bond closing between them. With a sigh she closed her eyes once again.

Breathe.

Just breathe.

She reached out like Master Luke had taught her all those months ago. Rey _saw_ the saber. An extension of herself. Elegant but deadly. A powerful ally in combat but graceful in retreat. Something that was part of her. Rey realized now, that it had been the kyber _within_ the blade that had called to her back on Takodana. Recognizing something within her even before she herself had. And when she opened her eyes, her saber staff floated in the air in front of her. With a large toothy grin on her face she grabbed it, quickly jumping up.

“We did it!” Rey exclaims, rushing out the door and startling a sleeping Rose who had been lying on the floor. She took a moment to rub the sleep from her eyes, but when her brain fully woke up, her eyes were blown wide open.

“Holy moly!” Rose yelped, jumping up and down. They both ran towards the mess hall were they were serving dinner, zoning in to where Finn ate with a disheveled looking Poe; BB-8 at the foot of the table.

“Let me be the first to point out that you both look like crazy people.” Poe laughed once they reached the table, the two young women in question breathing hard and sporting matching toothy grins.

“Am I the only one who doesn’t look like they’re about to fall from lack of sleep?” Finn wonders out loud, his fork dropping back to his bowl of noodles.

“We worked all day.” Rose explained. “To build this!” She bubbles, shaking her hands towards Rey, who held out her new saber. “Ta-da!” Rose laughed. Both of the men in front of them blinked, then their eyes widening like saucers.

“You built a new lightsaber?” Finn asks Rey, a surprised look on his face.

“Rose did all the parts.” She nods. “I just meditated and tried not to singe my hands.”

“Go on, turn it on! What are you waiting for?!” Rose grinned wildly. With a nod, Rey held her breath as she switched it on, the blade humming to life. A frown was quick to form on her brow.

“It…it’s…” She stammered. The three people who looked on at Rey’s new lightsaber mirrored her same puzzled expression.

“Wasn’t Luke Skywalker’s saber blue?” Finn asks perplexed, as he too had wielded the legendary blade in self defense.

Rey didn’t understand what she had done wrong. She switched off the blade. “I have to go.” She breathed, running back towards her quarters; ignoring her friend’s cries of protest and BB-8’s beeps. Big, fat, hot tears streamed down her face as she swung open the door to her dormitory.

Slamming the door shut, she slid down to the floor with a strangled sob.

“Rey?” Came the oddly worried voice of Kylo Ren. “Are you alright? Are you hurt?” He asked her. Rey looked up to where he was kneeling a few feet away from her, his tired eyes now alert and staring cautiously at her as if she were a wounded animal that would snap at him if he got too close.

“I failed.” She mutters angrily, looking away from his face. Rey notices the mud on his boots and the dirt on his cheek, she briefly wonders what he had been doing before the Bond had activated. _Kriff,_ he was an expert at showing up at the worst times possible.

“What are you talking about?” He frowned. She stared at him, angrily wiping her face that was probably all pink and blotchy by now.

“I followed your _excellent_ advice.” Rey chortles mirthlessly. “And I failed.” She extended her saber staff towards him. He didn’t take it.

“I don’t see how you could have failed.” Kylo says, relief washing over his face as he realizes that the situation wasn’t life threatening. “However if you mixed up the position of the _focusing lenses_ with the–”

“I don’t know what I did wrong!” Rey growled, standing up. Leaving Kylo kneeling on the floor in front of her. “I’m the last Jedi and coincidentally the worst one!” She fumed, tears brimming at her eyes again. “I followed all the stupid instructions, even Rose helped me so that all the parts I needed would be in optimum condition!”

“So…what’s wrong with it?” Kylo asked her. With a gulp, she switched on the blade on. His eyes widening in awe as he took in the sight before him. “It’s white.” He blurted out.

“Yes I can _see_ that.” Rey snapped. “So what did I do wrong?”

“Why do you assume you did something wrong?” Kylo questioned her, still looking at her blade wondrously.

“Did the med-droid drop you as a baby?” Rey sneered. “It’s supposed to be blue!”

“Yes I remember that detail, Rey. Well, before you modified it.” He reminded her. “You did nothing wrong.” He assures her.

“Then why is–”

“The crystal is the heart of the blade. Think of it as an energy source. Of it being alive somehow.” He tried to explain. “The kyber within is not sentient but it is very much attuned to the Force and that of the wielder of the blade that houses it.”

“Oh, what does that even _mean_?” She groans, switching the blade off. Hating that she had no one but him in the whole galaxy to help her. Rey wasn’t even sure he was the best person to ask, seeing as his cross-guard saber most likely hosted a cracked crystal if the exhaust ports were any indication. “Why did it change its color all of a sudden?”

“I don’t know.” He confesses with a shrug. “I’ve read about theories in which a crystal may change color to match the wielder’s essence within the Force. But they’re just that. Theories.”

“So I didn’t damage it.” Rey nodded, more to herself than him.

“Not anymore than when we broke it into two.” He snarks. It wasn’t the first time Rey noticed that he tended to reply almost wittily to everything she said. A habit that dangerously reminded her of his family. 

“It wasn’t my fault.” Rey retorted petulantly. “The saber called to me before I met you.” Referring to their fateful encounter within the forest of Takodana. When she had been scared to death by a creature in a mask. A creature she vaguely remembered seeing in a dream, or a nightmare. “If you weren’t so stubborn I would have–”

“Run away from the truth like you always do.” Kylo interrupts, rolling his eyes but his voice gravely serious.

“And what truth is that?” Rey scowled, not liking one bit where this conversation is going. “That I wanted to join you?” She parrots what he had said aboard _The Supremacy_ , amid the smoke and ruin of Snoke’s throne room. “You’re insane if you thought for a second that I would agree to your proposal.” She mentally chided herself at her choice of words. He had _offered_ his hand. Imagining him actually proposing made her think about…best not think it. And the worst part was, that for a split of a second she did consider it.

“You did want to join me.” Kylo presses, unfazed at what she had implied. Probably even unaware of it considering how daft he tended to be. “I felt it. I know you, Rey.”

“ _Don’t._ ” She seethes, white hot anger pulsing through her being. Loathing that he always found how to press her buttons. “You don’t know me.” She remembers her vision from Kashyyk. The vision of her parents. Perhaps, nobody knew her. Not even herself.

“I’ve been inside your head.” He reminds her gently, standing up to his full height. “I’ve seen the memories you locked deep within yourself,” Rey hissed as if she had been stung. “Felt your loneliness and desperation of waiting for somebody who would never come back. Of living a _lie_.” He continued his onslaught. “You and I are more alike than you’d like to think.” He muttered, his gaze dropping to the floor in front of him.

“We’re _nothing_ alike.” Rey shot back; even though, deep within her, she knew it was a lie.

“No?” He looked at her, those damned eyes staring intently at her. “Then why is the Force still connecting us? You tried severing the bond. It doesn’t work.” And when she had no answer for him– because she truly had no idea why the Force willed most things at all, he continued. “Do you realize that whatever’s going on, it would be far easier to overcome with us working together!” Kylo huffs, tired of her insistence to fight. “I’ve researched our bond. Do you want to know what we are?”

“Stop.” Rey whispered, a treacherous feeling making goosebumps rise on her arms and the back of her neck. Deep down, Rey felt like she had always known there was more to the Bond than what they had initially thought.

There was a reason why they could both enter each other’s minds with ease once he had triggered the awakening of the Force within her.

A reason as to why when she was growing up all alone in thewastelands of the Jakku desert she felt things that weren’t hers, dreamt of places she had never seen. Why they were each others equals both in their powers and in battle.A reason to why she had seen a boy in her vision back at Maz Kanata’s castle. A reason as to why they both felt complete and whole once they touched hands despite the time and space between them that stormy night inside Rey’s hut on Ach-To.

Neither of them knew what the Force wanted them to do, except for them to be together.

“Why do you keep fighting our nature, Rey?” He asked her softly, but there was an edge simmering behind it. They both knew that he was right, even if Rey hated that he was.”You hide yourself from everyone.” Kylo presses on. “That’s why you cover every scar you have.” He says, his voice just above a whisper. His hand lifted to lightly caress the leather armband that encompassed the scar from their fight with the Praetorian Guard.

“Ironic coming from you.” She counters tartly, taking one step back defensively. If he wanted to have this conversation, so be it. Rey wasn’t known for backing out of a fight. “I know you fight the pull to the light every time it calls. The conflict within: it’s tearing you at the seams, _Ben_.” Using his old name has the intended effect. If his low hiss was any indication. “We’re both experts at denying our truths.” And with that, she slammed her mental doors on him. Successfully blocking him out. The bond deactivating and him vanishing into thin air as he always did.

She may not know how to open the bond –not that she would have wanted to– but she damn well knew how to close it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm pretty sure this is a bit longer than other chapters! Totally in love with the idea of nerdy Ben and feral sand rat Rey trying her best to understand the Jedi way :)) 
> 
> I apologize if there's any typos, I edited it in a bit of a rush and I'm as blind as a bat! As always: Kudos, comments and shares are appreciated!! Come say hi on Tumblr <3


	10. Once a Jedi

Kylo Ren decimated dozens of training droids within the Citadel; the unstable and crude red saber in his hand glowing red that almost matched his anger.

It was hardly a convenient time to be training, he was pretty sure it was well past midnight within the day cycles of standard time. Yet it wasn’t an uncommon sight to see the Supreme Leader of the First Order in the training room, not since the death of General Leia Organa.

Kylo couldn’t get the moment out of his head. Walking the very front steps of the Citadel after the Siege of Corsuscant, that place of power and suffering. He felt the sharpest pain he had ever experienced in his life. Numbness washed over him like icy water had been poured on him. His legs actually gave in under him, falling to his knees weakly when right after, he felt his mother’s last thought be of him. Kuruk and Ap’lek had to haul his weakened body back to the ship.

“Ben.” She had whispered. Despite their short meeting on Varnak after all of those years and everything he had done, there was so much he had wanted to ask; so much left unsaid.

He had also felt Rey’s distress. He tried to reach out to her. To find out what had happened. To try and comfort her perhaps. But she had pushed him out of her mind, his head reeling by the sheer violence of it.

Even after almost a year without Snoke or Palpatine's –he didn’t even care at this point– ever looming presence inside his head, Kylo hadn’t grown accustomed to the silence. However foreign the feeling was, he relished the freedom he felt at being able to think whatever he liked. Which is why he came to the Knights and his’ personal training center after speaking to Rey. He was annoyed, irritated and frustrated. Mostly with himself but also with that sour-faced red headed weasel.

Kylo might be described as an act-now-think-later person, his impulsiveness the most characteristic trait that Han Solo had passed down to him; but he wasn’t a complete idiot. His suspicions that Hux was undermining his decisions at every turn were not without a cause. The General’s call to attack the Resistance on Kashyyk behind Kylo’s back only added fuel to the fire.

Had he been selfish in his rash decision to become the new Supreme Leader? Probably.

But he definitely felt naive and stupid to believe he could actually bring some change to the galaxy in his new position of power. Something his mother, who had always said that corruption and greed always stood in the way of making any real change– would have laughed at him for.

Truth is, Kylo didn’t have a plan.

Kriff, he hadn’t had a plan since he decided to kill Snoke to save Rey. And a year later, he still didn’t have one. Everyone with eyes and ears within the First Order could tell their new Leader lacked a clear vision about what he wanted. A dangerous thing considering High Command was starting to get more nervous as the days passed and they still hadn’t been able to locate where the mysterious message of revenge from the Sith Eternals hailed from.

And the few times he did know what he wanted like trying to abolish slavery galaxy-wide or opening new schools in the poorer sectors of the Outer Rim, the blasted general always found a way to turn the entire High Command of generals and admirals against him.

_“We have several ties and agreements with slave traders like the Hutt Cartel, we cannot simply turn our backs on them. They would find it treasonous and they’d become a nuisance to deal with.”_

_“If you educate the masses, people will start asking questions we will not answer. They’ll be met with violence and then we’ll be doing the Resistance’s dirty work by filling their ranks ourselves. No, keep them fed and they’ll be none the wiser.”_

Kylo should have had him executed after the attack on Kashyyk, but most of the council was loyal to him. If he had acted on instinct, he would have cut off the head of the snake only to have dozens more growing out from the wound. Most of the commanders believed in some capacity that the First Order could truly succeed where the fallen Empire did not.

_Relics the lot of them_ , he thought as he slashed through yet another droid.

And there was also the matter with Palpatine, a chill running down his back at the thought of it despite his warm body temperature. The legendary Sith Lord had tormented two generations of his family and was now after Rey as well. Kylo wasn’t about to take the issue lightly.

Not for the first time tonight his mind drifted back to Rey as it always tended to do. The headstronggirl from Jakku. He wasn’t angry at her for rejecting the one thing he could offer at the moment amongst the remnants of their throne room battle a year ago. No, he resented the fact that things didn’t go as either of them planned. Kylo begrudgingly admired Rey’s strength and conviction to teach herself through the ancient books Skywalker had travelled across the galaxy to find.

He remembered the forms she had been studying when the bond activated. _Soresu_. Kylo recognized it from old holovids of the Clone Wars. His namesake was prone to relying on that form.With a huff, he opened the basic _Shii-Cho_ stance. One that had been engrained in his memory long before he had become who he was today.

It had been years since he went over the old forms, Skywalker would have commented his unnecessary use of strength or how he could never quite control his temper during a spar. But here, Kylo was free to do whatever he wanted. He moved through the forms freely and leisurely.

Unaware of the presences that loomed viewing from above on the second floor.

It was two of the Knights of Ren who had returned late from one of their patrols on one of the lower levels of Galactic City. Vicrul, the tall blonde man with an unremarkable narrow face from Lothal and Ushar, a green-skinned Mirilian with half of his face covered with tattoos. Both of their identities concealed by their helmets.

“He’s practicing Jedi moves.” Ushar comments, arms crossed over his broad chest. “Does he still cling to the light?” He asked the taller man, referring to the light side of the Force.

“Once a Jedi, always a Jedi.” Vicrul spat with disdain, watching the man below move with a grace he had long forgotten he was capable of. “He hasn’t been himself since that desert rat killed Snoke.”

“The girl wasn’t the one who killed Supreme Leader Snoke.”A voice from behind them spoke. Both men turned their masked heads towards the person who had spoken. General Hux walked from out the shadows, intelligent eyes alert.

“General.” Vicrul nods in acknowledgement.

“Your master appears to have lied to you as well.” The general sniffed, picking out imaginary lint from his impeccably clean uniform. “Kylo Ren is a traitor.” He said simply. Both of the knights unsheathed their weapons, ready to defend their master.

“That won’t be necessary.” Hux smirked. “Would you like to know how he betrayed you?” He tempted the men in front of him, he knew curiosity would never betray him.

And when neither of them denied it, he spoke: “Good. Follow me.” He turned on his heel and walked back from where he had come from, the men exchanging a glance between them before following him into the shadows deeper within the Citadel.

*** * ***

“Rey!” Poe greets her with a smile when she walked into the command center. Connix and D’Acy nodding to her from where they continued to study the mysterious message from ‘beyond the grave’ as Connix had called it. “You’re just the person I wanted to see! I was gonna ask if you’d–”

“I want to be part of the counterattack on Ord Mantell.” Rey interrupted him, her mind made up.

She had been mulling about it for a day. This didn’t need to be personal, Rey was merely doing her moral duty to keep the galaxy from succumbing completely to the First Order. To show them and _anyone_ else who tried that they weren’t going to be complacent while they tried to install a new tyranny and sow fear into the galaxy.

“Who told you about that?” Sputtered Poe, his eyes going wide. Rey’s cheeks reddened, glancing briefly at Finn, who now seemed all too preoccupied by the star charts in front of him. “Finn!” Poe whined. “This mission is on a need-to-know basis!”

“Look you didn’t specifically mention it was confidential at the time.” Finn clears his throat, his cheeks beginning to redden. “I just thought– you know…I’d give her a heads up. She needed to know.” He shrugged, his eyes giving away that he hadn’t meant any harm.

Poe sighed, his eyes shut as he pinched the bridge of his nose. Becoming the Resistance’s leader overnight was taking its toll on the usually breezy pilot. His eyes looked tired once he opened them, his skin looked a bit paler when it usually was a warm olive tone and his hair was greying at the temples. Even if he was a few years older than Rey, he wasn’t _that_ old. “Only if you’re ready, Rey.” Poe told her seriously, knowing exactly how hard Leia's passing had been. “You know we don’t have ships to spare so you would be flying the Falcon.” He says wearily, referring to Chewbacca’s sulking presence around the ship.

“I’ll talk to him.” Rey assured him with a firm nod. “When do we leave, _Genera_ l?” She asks him, amused at the way his chest puffs up a bit at hearing his new title, reminding her of the Porgs from Ahch-To. Yet to her it was still strange to refer to him as such. Leia’s ever present image vividly associated with the word in her mind.

“Tomorrow, at first light.” Poe informed her. “Be sure to be ready to fly at oh-six-hundred hours. We’re only nine hours away, Snap and I are trying to plan out a route that’ll get us there in six.” He winks at her, turning his attention back to the star chart in front of him.

Rey took it as her cue to leave, and so she walked towards the hangar to see if she would find the aforementioned co-pilot of the Millenium Falcon.

*** * ***

“Chewie!” Rey called out from the foot of the ramp that led to the inside of the ship.

When she heard no response, she walked up the ramp. The place smelled. Not unpleasantly but definitely strong and musky. Chewie wasn’t usually messy, an odd thing considering his size and well…appearance. So she was surprised to see things like blankets and Porg feathers splayed around the floor.

“Chewie?” She tried again, only this time she heard the groan of the wookie. He walked from his quarters, the hair atop his head messier and more shaggy looking than she had seen in a while.

He blinked at her sleepily.

“There’s a counterattack mission planned for tomorrow on Ord Mantell, the Order has a deepdock there.” She starts, staring intently at the wookie’s reaction. But he said nothing. “I offered the Falcon. Just thought you should know.” She mumbled the last part. Thinking on it now, if anyone had any authority over the Falcon it was Chewbacca not her. He remained quiet for a moment and then let out a yelp that sounded almost cheerful. Her eyes darted to his, a wide toothy smile brightening her face.

“Really?” Rey exclaimed in surprise. To which Chewie nodded and let out a yowl. “Alright then! We have to be ready by first light.” She relayed the instructions Poe had given her. “I’ll be here before that to help you ready the Falcon.” Rey promised.

Chewie gave her a mock salute, before sheepishly admitting that he’d be sure to have the Falcon spotless before dinner tonight, earning a chuckle from Rey. It was nice to see him a bit more cheerful since Leia’s death. Even if it was after she had told them they would blow ships up.

That night, lying in bed, Rey wondered briefly if he’d be there in Ord Mantell. But sleep took over her awareness before she could even think about why her thoughts were going towards that direction and she quickly dozed off, the world going dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A filler chapter for these trying times. We're getting closer to the juicy stuff so I hope you're still with me! Kudos, comments and shares are always appreciated greatly <3 
> 
> Many thanks to my wonderful Beta!!


	11. Echoes from beyond

_Where was she?_

_She’d never seen a planet so desolate in her life. And she’d lived on Jakku her whole life. The world she was in was a desert of red sand, a strange black sun was beating down her face but somehow she felt cold. Somehow, she felt that she had seen this place before._

_Rey could have sworn the wind whispered to her as she walked on towards the entrance of a rocky valley. The mountains surrounding the valley partially blocked the sun and she felt even colder once she stepped into the cool shadows._

_Within the valley, she saw ruins._

_Thousands of monuments and obelisks and giant statues that once must have been a formidable sight now lay in ruin on the ground or looked as if they would crumble if she so much as breathed in their direction. The ruins were engraved with symbols and runes unknown to her. The dark side flowed freely in this place, bathing it and caressing her._

_Then she remembered… Her vision._

_This was the place the Force had shown her._

_Rey twitched her hands anxiously as she walked deeper into the valley, coming face to face at the end of the valley where a black pyramid blocked out the remaining sunlight. She gulped looking to the entrance where she was sure the whispers were coming from._

_A fluttering of wings made her quickly turn towards the only sound._

_Atop the ruins of a toppled statue was perched a single bird. It was small, unlike the steelpeckers from the deserts of Jakku but larger than a porg. Its large wide intelligent eyes peering at her from where she was perched, her cream and green colored plumage almost shining in the fading sun._

_“Hello there.” Rey said to it, a small shy smile forming on her face. The plump bird hooted in response. “Where am I?” She asked it. At which the bird gave no response. It was more quiet than a porg too it seemed._

_Rey walked up the crumbled steps of the temple. The whispers where getting louder and the darkness within beckoned her to get closer. Her heart stuttered as she felt fear seizing her limbs._

_The bird hooted at her, flying and perching itself on her shoulder, its short tail a small comfort on her back. Rey did’t know why, but when she felt the bird’s weight on her shoulder, she didn’t feel so scared anymore. With a deep breath she braced herself and entered the pyramid._

_It was cold, damp and horrifyingly dark. Rey couldn’t see two feet in front of her and she feared she might fall._

Rey. _Whispered a voice from the dark. A chill creeped down her spine, making her shudder. The strange bird squeezed her shoulder reassuringly._

_“Palpatine.” She snarled, clenching her fists and raising them. As if that would protect her from a powerful Sith lord._

_The whisper merely chuckled._ Palpatine has been dead for a very long time.

_“Who are you?” She asked the whisper, her voice laced with bravado she didn’t particularly feel at the moment._

I’ve been called many things. _The voice replied nonchalantly._

_“Show yourself.” She gulped, ignoring the way the hairs at the nape of her neck stood up._

As you wish. _The voice chuckled darkly._

_Blue flames erupted from sconces on the walls leading up to the back of the temple. She walked towards the end of the chamber, trying not to fixate on how the shadows seemed to move from behind the strange light. The mural in front of her depicted a person. Or a being. It was intricately detailed. She could see he was male. His skin white and was bald save for two red lines painted on top of his head that led to his glowing red eyes, below them was also painted in red. He wore only black and had a golden ring painted around his right outstretched hand._

_“Is this who you are?” She asked the voice, daring not to take a step closer to the mural._

A depiction of me _. The voice said._ Do you know where you are? _It asked her. Rey shook her head in response._ Come now, think. You’re a smart girl. _The voice pressed._

_“A temple.” Rey gulped, taking a step back from the mural of the being. This was were she had seen her parents._

Correct. _The voice conceded._ Species from all over the galaxy came to worship here.

_“Then what happened?” Rey asked, not knowing why she continued to talk to this thing when all of her nerve endings and instincts told her to run._

I faded away. _The voice lamented._ I became what mothers told their children as scary stories so they wouldn’t stray far from the light. But you wouldn’t know anything about that would you, Rey? _The voice jibed._

_“What do you want from me?” Rey seethed, trying to ignore the creature’s bait for her anger albeit barely._

For you to see, where you come from and what is to come. _Came the voice’s answer. Suddenly, the paintings eyes glowed brilliant red that contrasted to a purple amid the light bather in blue flame and the ring around his hand was bright, so bright that Rey tried to shield her eyes. The bird perched on her shoulder hooted so loud it was almost a shriek, digging its talons on the tender flesh of her shoulder._

With a gasp Rey shot out of bed.

She was back on the Resistance base on Ajan Kloss. It had all been a dream, she was safe. Rey hissed when she felt a sting on her shoulder, four small holes on her shoulder where bleeding lightly. Where the bird had been perched in her dream.

Rey walked over to the shelf where she had placed the Jedi texts and took the smallest one out, its aging spine harsh to the touch when she opened it to the page that most interested her. She sat down, her body resuming the meditation pose Luke had taught her. She closed her eyes, trying to find her center even if she felt more than unnerved by her dream.

“Be with me.” Rey whispered reverently, her rapidly beating heart slowing down thanks her controlled breaths. “Be with me.” She repeats, a bit more urgently this time.

Leia had passed on, perhaps she could reach her. If Rey were to communicate with them, they could help her decipher what she had just seen. When she meditated with this intention, Rey could sometimes feel like someone was reaching back to her. Every time she got closer to them, they got further and further away. This time was no different.

“They’re not with me.” Rey whispered shakily, her eyes opening to the still empty room.With a sigh, she washed her face to get rid of the cold sweat that drenched her, Rey knew that sleep would evade her all night.

* * *

“Alright listen up!” Poe calls out to the rapidly filling hangar, the rag tag group of rebels huddling around him in a crescent moon; Finn, Snap, Connix and D’Acy standing behind him. “The key to this airstrike is destruction, if we’re honest. Rose has left a crate with a special refill to your ship’s guns. They’re highly flammable so please be careful.” He instructed.

“Now, Threepio has sent out the route we will be taking, we should get there in six hours standard time. They won’t see us coming so the minute TIEs get there, we won’t stay. We’re in and out, I don’t want any losses today is that clear?”

Hums of agreement rang out.

Poe nodded in satisfaction. “Alright then, be ready to fly in ten!” He boomed, the pilots clapped as they went to their ships. X-Wings, A-Wings, bombers and other ships lined up in the hanger.

“Finn!” Rey shouts, trotting over to where her friend was talking to Connix and D’Acy. “Are you coming?” She asks him.

“I’m not a pilot. So I’m staying in command.” He said apologetically, gesturing to Connix and D’Acy who were waiting for him. “Besides, someone’s got to save your asses if it all goes to hell.” He teased, elbowing her side gently. She gave him a smile. “We’ll be okay.” He promised her.

She nodded and walked towards the Falcon, where Chewbacca was going up the ramp, Rose’s crate in his large arms. “Chewie you better have left Ro back in the base!” Rey hollers as she initiated the takeoff sequence inside the cockpit.

The responding chirp that came from within the Falcon made her groan. She liked the Porg but he was always getting in the way. And Chewie being Chewie would smack him away then Ro would respond by tugging at the Wookie’s hair and well- it all went downhill from there.

R2-D2 beeped an explicit word at the sound of the Porg, not liking his wheels getting stuck on the bird’s poo-doo and Rey agreed wholeheartedly.

“All wings report in.” Finn ordered from the command center. The sirens of the hanger sounding loudly in the background. “Black Leader. Copy?”

“Copy.” Came the staticky voice of Poe from his X-Wing, BB-8 beeping that he was also present and ready too.

“Red Leader.” Finn continued his listing with the corresponding pilots all replying that they were all on stand by awaiting instructions. “Falcon. Copy?” He asked.

“Copy.” Rey spoke, her fingers flexing in anticipation atop the Falcon’s controls.

“Pilots, you are clear for takeoff.” Finn announced, the siren of the hanger turning into a countdown.

_5, 4, 3, 2, 1._

They were up in the air in no time, the Falcon zipping upwards towards the planet’s atmosphere. Once the hyper drive was primed, all she did was wait for the go ahead, the blinking stars of space always putting her in a good mood.

“Get ready to jump.” Poe instructed from the channel. “On my mark: three, two, one, now!”

And they were off, time and space blurring together once they entered the hyper lane.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a little rough, the holidays have been a little bit difficult for me. I won't be able to post the next chapter next Sunday as planned so I'll try to give you a double update when I can to make up for it :) I hope you are all well, I'm sending you lot's of love and light!! Kudos, comments and shares are always appreciated <3


	12. Attack on Ord Mantell

Kylo felt like he had slept on a bed of rocks. If he had any sleep. Most nights he couldn’t sleep at all and he’d just be in a really bad mood all day.

Today was no different, his head resting on the palm of his gloved hand as Admiral Septimus Ifen droned on his excuses as to why his division hadn’t been able to locate where the transmission came from. Hux congratulated the blubbering old man’s efforts, giving a side-eye to Kylo who had remained silent for most of the council meeting.

“Speaking of the Sith Eternals,” Hux cleared his throat. “It has come to my attention that…” But Kylo couldn’t hear him, he was too busy frowning at the sound of a laugh. He frowned as he craned his neck to see the entirety of the room.

There. Two playful eyes peered inside the conference room.

Kylo shot up from his seat at the head of the table.

“Sir?” Hux quizzed perplexed. Kylo paid him no attention as the laughter beckoned him towards it. All of the First Order’s highest in commands gawked at their Supreme Leader as if he had just turned into a tauntaun. Kylo swept out of the room and into the corridor, where the laughter still rung out like a bell.

A flash of tawny skin.

He followed it.

The laughter echoed, it bounced off the walls of the corridors until it led him to the throne room he barely used. Atop the raised dais and sitting on the imposing throne, was Rey.

She looked different than what he was used to. Her hair was cropped short, it reached just below her chin. Her clothes were black and sleek, gone was her perfunctory wraps. In its place she wore a high collar that stopped where her neck began and made an inverted triangle that showed the skin above her sternum. Her clothes almost looked constricting in a way.

She sat pin straight. Unnaturally so. Her hazel eyes trained on him and her lips curled in a knowing smirk.

“Rey?” He breathed hesitantly, wary at what this was. This wasn’t Rey.

_Is this not what you wanted?_ A voice queried. He had heard that voice before, back on Mustafar. Kylo remembered the voice from his vision. It sent a chill down his spine.

Palpatine.

“I thought you said she would die?” Kylo asked the voice without taking his eyes off of Rey, his hands inching towards where his saber was clipped to his belt.

_Perhaps she may be spared._ The voice answered saccharinely. Kylo glanced around the throne room, hoping to find the source of the voice to no avail. _I’ll ask again, is this not what you wanted?_

Kylo stared back at the not-Rey, her gaze felt distant. It wasn’t her, he reminded himself. He prayed that it wasn’t her. “Not like this.” Kylo answered, after considering it for a moment.

When he had asked Rey to join him, even back on Starkiller, both desperate attempts of keeping her with him. He had sensed within her a kindred spirit. Someone who was just as lonely and lost as he was. As he got to know her through the bond, he realized he wanted more. Kylo wasn’t just seeking her out of loneliness, he wanted to _be_ with her. But he also wanted her to be with him. After the events on Snoke’s throne room, Kylo had realized that she wanted Ben Solo.

_No?_ The voice quipped. _One mustn’t lie._ It tsk-tsked.

“She’ll never turn.” Kylo bit out, he was getting annoyed by this voice forgetting his initial distrust at whoever or whatever it was.

The voice chuckled at this. _And yet she reaches for the dark every opportunity she gets. You’ve sensed it. The_ darkness _within._

“She’s strong with the Force.” Kylo acknowledges. “Stronger than she knows.” He added, recalling having had a conversation like this with his old master.

_Strong doesn’t begin to describe it._ The voice remarked. _Her awakening a year ago made ripples in the Force. Such raw strength. Finally an equal to match your own, Young Skywalker._ Kylo didn’t like where this was going. Why was this being so interested in her? _I warn you, the girl is not who you think she is._ The voice said, stating it as a fact.

At this, Kylo’s curiosity got the better of him. “Who is she?” He asks, staring into the eyes of the girl in front of him. For a second he could pretend that it was her.

Kylo raised one of his gloved hands towards her, but before he could caress her cheek, she vanished.

He turned around only to find the real Rey –or at least her through the Force Bond– standing a few feet away, walking towards him.

“Rey.” He breathed in relief at the sight of her normal self. Her head snapped up from where she had been trying to open a ration bar to look at him. She stopped in her tracks. “Where are you?” He asked her.

“Why would I share Resistance secrets to a ruthless war lord?” She cocked her head to the side, her arms crossing defensively in front of her chest.

“Rey, you’re not safe.” Kylo hissed, taking a couple of steps in her direction.

“You’re right.” She agreed with a nod. “I have a Force connection with the most dangerous person in the known galaxy.”

Kylo gaped at her. “I-I meant the Sith Eternal.” He stammered, his cheeks flaming and his pride a bit wounded. “I’m hearing voices and seeing things.” Kylo continued. “I–…Rey, they want _you_.”

Rey gulped, taking in a shaky breath as the weight of this knowledge fully registers in her head. But then, she blinked– a hard steeliness seeping into her eyes and her mask of bravado settled once more on her face; tilting her chin up high. “Let them find me.” She challenged in a harsh whisper.

And then, she was gone.

Leaving the throne room colder than it had been before. He stumbled out of there, he was almost suffocating from the darkness that lingered. Outside, he found Vicrul and Ushar waiting for him.

“We must find the girl. Whatever means necessary.” Kylo addresses the Knights in front of him, he was running out of time. Whatever Palpatine and the Eternals had planned it most definitely involved Rey. And Kylo wasn’t so sure the Resistance understood the severity of the situation. He needed to keep her safe.

“Master, she is of no consequence.” Came the guttural modulated voice of Vicrul. “We should be focusing on the threat by–“ Suddenly he gasped, grasping at his neck.

“When I give an order,” Kylo Ren snarls, suddenly angry at the Knight for questioning his authority; clouded by the shroud of darkness emanating from the empty throne room. “You follow it.”

“Y-yes, Master.” The Knight stammered, massaging his neck.

Kylo released him from his chokehold and nodded. “See that it is done.” He dismissed the Knights. Not before spotting a familiar red-head all but running towards them from the turbolift.

“There you are!” Hux said wheezing as if he had been running. “The deepdock on Ord Mantell is being attacked as we speak.” The man informed the Supreme Leader.

“Dispatch a squad of TIEs.” Kylo says off-handedly, already walking away from the General.

“Sir, the Millenium Falcon has been a confirmed presence during this attack.” Hux stressed.

Kylo stops dead in his tracks, his stomach sinking. “Prepare my ship.” He instructed the General. Unbeknownst to the man who walked quicker down the corridor, the three individuals left behind all shared the same look.

*** * ***

Ord Mantell had seemed to glow a pretty pink when they reached its orbit.

Rey could see once they entered the atmosphere, the beauty of the planet ended there. The world seemed boringly bland, every landmass dotted with mountain chains that looked exactly the same as one another. The shipyard housed almost a dozen Star Destroyers, that looked even bigger in-world than they did out in space.

“It’s showtime!” Poe hollered encouragingly through the commlink. “You know the drill. Let’s make Leia proud! See you back on base kiddos!” And with that, the fight was on.

It was true that the First Order hadn’t been prepared for their surprise counterattack. Chewiecheered on as he commandeered the gunning position, while Rey flew the Falcon as close as she could so more damage could be done.

“Alright I’m going in!” Came the voice of Snap. “Falcon, cover me!” From where she was seated, she could catch a glimpse of the X-Wing in question doing a nose dive towards the communication tower. Not a minute later the sound of a large explosion caught her attention, Rey held her breath.

“They’re offline!” Said Connix from where she was sitting, thousands of miles away on Ajan Kloss.

“Nicely done Snap!” Poe complimented, earning whoops and cheers from the other pilots. “Time for some real damage.”

“Hold it Poe.” Finn intoned. “We’re picking up a signal. Prepare for incoming.” He warned. Then the sky was filled with TIE fighters, the roar of their ion engines unmistakeable.

He was here. Rey sensed him before she had even seen his ship. His presence practically glowing with ferocity and determination. Something odd pulled at her chest. It was the closest they had been in months.

On every battlefield, they were too far away from where the other was. Sometimes, not even seeing each other, only sensing them like a small prickle among the dozens of life forms that always surrounded them.

“Chewie!” She calls out, earning a roar in response from the Wookie. “Be careful with the Silencer. It’s him.” And Rey didn’t doubt for a minute that being the son of Han Solo, gave him an upper hand to most of the pilots present in battle.

“Do your damage and get out of here!” Poe ordered. “I don’t want any losses!”

“We’ll distract them!” Rey quipped, already piloting the Falcon away from the deep-dock. Chewie growling his protest.

“Rey, no.” Poe said, his tone alarmed through the commlink. “We stay together! Do not break formation!”

“Poe! I can do this. I’ll meet you back on base!” Rey snarled as she saw in her sensors that it was working, the Silencer followed her. And so did the rest of the TIE Fighters, breaking formation to protect their Supreme Leader.

“Dammit, Rey! Disengage! That’s an or–” Rey switched the commlink channel off. Much to the protests of Chewbacca, who was already yowling for them to go back.

“I can do this!” She yells back. “Trust me.” Rey wasn’t sure how, but she was going to protect her friends. At any cost.

The Silencer was quickly gaining on the rickety freighter.Both ships and its pilots maneuvered and zig zagged through the cloud formations. Kylo hit the throttle, Rey knew just what to do.

“Hold on!” Rey yelled to Chewie as she did a 360 degree turn and sped the Falcon in the other direction; hearing the indignation in the wookie’s groan and R2-D2’s scream, the ancient droid holding on for dear life. She heaved with exertion, directing the Falcon into a snowcapped mountain range.

Kylo was still in hot pursuit and this time he had the upper hand, she notices. The Silencer was smaller than the Falcon, which made it easier for him to speed even closer to the tail of the Falcon.

Alarms chirped in her ears, indicating that The Silencer was most likely going to ram into them. Biting her lip in concentration, she quickly banked into a sliver in-between two ridges. Thinking on her toes, she pulled the nose of the freighter upwards, making a beeline towards the atmosphere.

“I’m going to jump from here!” She announced to Chewie, already prepping to make a run for it to the hyperlane. “Get ready!” Rey ignores the angry shouts from the wookie and punched it, the pink clouds blurring together with the stars.

Rey let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding in when they were finally safe. Chewbacca grumbled as he staggered into the cockpit, pushing Artoo out of the way.

“I’m sorry.” She breathes, a sly smile on her face. The old wookie patted the top of her head and moaned something about being thankful for being alive, sitting down in the co-pilot seat. With a sigh, she puts the Falcon on autopilot for the remainder of their journey back.

*** * ***

“Rey.” Poe stormed over to her the second the Falcon landed in the hanger, Finn following him with a furrowed brow and BB-8 chirping to ask if she had been injured. “What did I say? In and out. You disobeyed a direct order!”

“You wouldn’t have been able to do that if I hadn’t distracted the TIE’s!” Rey argued, hating the way she sounded so cocky. It wasn’t luck. She knew he’d follow her.

“Rey, you can’t just go rogue like that!” Poe stressed. “If something would’ve happened– look, the General talked to me before she…you know,” Clearing his throat with hands on his hips. “And one of the things we talked about was _you_.” Rey frowns at this. “You’re the last Jedi. We have to protect you. Especially with the Sith Eternal running amuck. We don’t know what’s going on.” 

“Poe, I’m not more important than anyone else in the Resistance.” Rey argued, hating the feeling of being singled out. “I took a risk and it worked.”

“ _This_ time. It worked this time.” Poe snapped. “How do we know he didn’t put a tracker on you?Or if he followed you into the lane?”

“Because I know he didn’t!” Rey shot lamely, it’s not like she was going to tell the single most powerful person in the Resistance that she had a connection to the Supreme Leader of the First Order. And even then, she didn’t really know what she could actually tell him because neither of them seemed to have any idea as to how it worked.

“Poe,” Finn spoke up, clasping his hand on the other man’s shoulder affectionately. “You all got here safe and sound. Plus we destroyed some Star Destroyers. Isn’t that what matters?” Poe considered him for a moment, with a sigh and a shrug he looked at Rey once more.

“Strike one.” Poe raises a finger non-threateningly towards Rey. “Third strike you’re out, Rey. I won’t compromise your safety.” He tells her seriously. “We need you out there but not if you’re not going to be responsible. Got it?” Rey nods, effectively chastised. “Get something to eat. And get some rest, you look like bantha crap.” He huffs, playful again as he makes a gesture towards his own bags under his eyes. Poe gives her and Finn a nod before walking out the hanger.

“Is he always like this?” Rey asks Finn as she watches the General’s retreating form, BB-8 in tow like always.

“Bossy and kinda cranky? Only as of late.” Finn chuckles fondly, shaking his head lightly. “Go easy on him though, he’s still figuring out how to be a leader.”

“Leia left big shoes to fill, huh.” Rey mused, turning around to walk back to the Falcon to help Chewie check the ship with an indignant huff.

“Oh no you’re not!” Finn exclaims, quickly hooking his arm over her shoulders, effectively turning her towards the exit. But before Rey could protest, he said: “The General has given you official orders that you eat and rest.” He tutted.

“As a senior officer, I out-rank you Madame Jedi and I simply _cannot_ allow you to disobey orders.” Finn said with an air of mock-superiority. Rey laughs at this and lets him lead her out of the hangar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Long time no see babies!! Back to our scheduled programming on Sundays after this I hope. Anyway, wishing you are all well and that this new crazy year that just started doesn't overwhelm us from the start like the last one, huh. Many thanks to my wonderful Beta reader @alwaysuntilstarsburnout amazing and patient and encouraging as ever!! 
> 
> As always: Kudos, comments and shares are like little desert flowers on a Jakku dune :) hahahaha 
> 
> Thank you if you're still sticking around!!


	13. Pieces of broken memories

Rey walked into her room with a content smile due to her now full belly and her hands working gently on her dripping hair straight out of the fresher. It wasn’t lost on Rey how luxurious she felt to wash herself with actual running water. Back on Jakku, she was lucky if she could afford to clean herself in the communal sonics of Niima Outpost. But here, Rey could take as much time as she wanted and was even handed her own bar of soap.

Rey was working through the knots in her hair when he appeared. She didn’t notice him at first, lightly humming to herself a tune she couldn’t remember for the life of her where she’d heard it but couldn’t get out of her head. And when she did notice him through the small standard-issue mirror, she let out a small squeak of surprise; thankful a yelp didn’t come out. Rey quickly covered her mouth.

“Well this is weird.” He was lying down on her bed, well _his_ bed, she supposed. A plain black t-shirt and pants clothing his form, black socks to hiding his big feet. Both of his hands were crossed atop his broad chest.

“We really need to learn how to control this thing.” She mutters, crossing her arms over her own chest. Painfully aware that she had taken off her breast band before putting on her nightclothes.

“I agree.” Kylo concurs, blinking towards her. He looked almost relaxed like that.

“Do you mind?” Rey sighed, stuffing her wooden brush inside her top drawer.

“Where are you?” He asks her abruptly, ignoring her question. “Everywhere you go, you’re surprisingly hard to find.” Kylo mused, giving no indication that he was going to close the bond any time soon.

“You’re hard to get rid of.” Rey snorts, leaning on a wall. He did look comically out of place in her bed. She was pretty sure he was larger than her modest accommodation. “I’d like to go to bed now.” Rey cleared her throat.

Kylo blinks, his cheeks going a bit pink as he slowly gets out of bed, outstretching a hand towards it. Rey scrunches up her nose in mild amusement and walks towards it, careful not to come in direct contact with him in the small quarters. She pulls back the covers and shimmies into it. Rey wasn’t sure if he had gotten the gist of her wanting to be alone.

He hadn’t.

Instead, Kylo made himself comfortable by sliding down the wall and sitting down with his legs crossed. She frowned as she tried to focus at the ceiling above her, counting the dots on the panels; not actually knowing what to do. “Do you…want to talk about…your mother?”

“Not really, but I’m assuming you do.”

“What was she like?” Rey asks him hesitantly, unsure if he would answer. She’d thought about asking him this often. She’d known Leia as a strong general and a mentor. Which was impressive enough. But it was said by people like Poe and Snap, that her golden years in the Rebel Alliance were legendary. That she was fire made flesh, a spitfire through and through.

Kylo sucked in a breath. Thinking. Rey could practically hear the wheels in his brain turning.“Kind.” He gulped. “She was strong too. Always fighting for what she believed in. Stubborn might be a better word to use.” Kylo sighed.

“They tried to be around, but rebuilding the galaxy is hard.” By ‘they’ he meant Han and Leia. He still couldn’t talk about them without extracting himself from the past. As if he could have been talking about anybody and not his parents. “She was a senator and he…well you know how he was.” Kylo’s voice hardened fractionally at this, his eyes glossing over lightly before quickly blinking it away. “They were very _busy._ ” He settled on, not giving much away. Or perhaps burying the memories even more. “But she always came home for dinner.” He added softly.

“So why did–” Rey started.

“Sharing one meal a day is hardly considered raising your son.” Kylo snapped. “You’d know if you hadn’t grown up alone and starving on that backwater planet.” He was defensive, his face twisted in a snarl. Like a wounded animal.

He hadn’t meant to lash out, Rey sensed the conflict within him. He was naturally prone to rage, but she had a feeling it was his affinity to the dark side that eased it.

Still, Rey couldn’t mask the hurt and indignation she felt in her muttered reply: “You’re right.”

Rey couldn’t see him wincing after she turned her whole body to face the wall instead of him. Bitter tears threatening to spill over her cheeks. As they had done a thousand times before back on Jakku when she’d scratched a line for every day that passed without her parents. For all that she had seen, she still didn’t know the entire story about who her parents were, where they came from and why they had gone to Jakku.

She didn’t even know how they had _died_.

Rey still couldn’t understand why someone like him could turn away from his family so easily. They had all loved him. Han. Leia. And even Luke. Rey had felt it. She sometimes even sensed Chewie thinking about him as well.

Rey often thought how easy it would be to go back to thinking he was just a creature in a mask. _No_ , her traitorous heart beat, _he will forever be Ben to you._

“I…I’m sorry.” Ben mumbled at her back. Rey frowns at the foreign words from his lips. “They sent me away when I was very young.” He continues, this time more softly than he had before. “I think I was about nine, maybe? But I was mostly alone before that.” He had only been four years older than her when she was abandoned. Just a boy really. Not understanding why he had been sent away.

Rey doesn’t know if he’s aware that he’s projecting his memory into her mind.

*** * ***

_She sees a boy peering outside of a room littered with toys._

_Tiny starships, blasters, a battered tooka doll and a small rebel fighter doll that looked like it was made by himself. The boy was small and scrawny, a stark contrast to the mountain of a man he would become. His mess of dark curls reached just above his big round ears, that made him insecure but only endeared everyone around him._

_It was the boy from her vision on Takodana._

_What surprised her was how similar he looked like his parents even in his infancy. Han’s strong nose that he’d grow into as well as his chin. His wide, intelligent, shapely eyes were all Leia’s. Rey couldn’t help but notice the haunted marks beneath them, not prominent enough for his parents to notice his lack of sleep but present all the same._

“I don’t want to send him away.” _Han’s gruff voice rung out in a harsh whisper from behind the closed door at the end of the hall. “_ He’s just a kid. He’s _my_ kid. I know what it feels like to be left all alone.”

“You think I want to send him away? He’s my son too you know.” _Leia whispered yelled back._

“Oh he’s your son now, _Senator_?” _Han shot back incredulously._

“You’re one to talk. How’s _Lando_ by the way? Send him my love next time you scurry off with him to relieve your golden days, flyboy!” _With a sigh, Leia realizes they’re digging into old wounds. This was about their son, not them. “_ I sense something in him… a darkness. I don’t know how else to explain it.”

“Again with the mumbo jumbo.” _Han replied with a grunt._ “He’s fine. So he threw a tantrum, every kid does it. Only he– y’know…threw things around with his _mind_.”

“Han…we don’t know the Force like Luke does.” _Leia answered gently. “_ We can’t help him like he can.”

“What good has it done to Luke, huh? _” Han muttered almost resentful. “_ How long has it been since we’ve seen him? Because I don’t remember seeing him at your name day last month.”

“Stop, you know why. He needs to rebuild the Jedi Order.” _She told him truthfully, wholeheartedly believing that her brother had a destiny to fulfill. A different path that called to him._ “Ben talks in his sleep.” _Leia adds softly._

_Han is quiet at this._

“He’s always had trouble sleeping.” _Han concedes with a tired sigh. “_ What does he say?”

“A name.” _Leia answers simply. Rey feels her stomach twist with dread._ “Han, I just want what’s best for him. I’m worried he’ll turn out like…”

“He won’t…He won’t.” _Han assured her, stopping Leia from even finishing her train of thought._ “We’ll send him to Luke, then.” _He finally agreed._ “He’ll know what to do.”

_That memory fizzes out and fades into another. One that stops Rey’s heart for a second. A ship is flying away. Not just any ship. It’s the_ Millenium Falcon _._

“Come back!” _The boy yelled, tears streaming down his face. Making Rey’s heart ache for him._

“It’s all right, Ben.” _She heard Luke’s voice but couldn’t see his face, too busy focused on the boy’s gut wrenching tear-streaked face._

“Come,” _He ushers him towards the temple._ “I will show you around.” _But Luke walked ahead, his mind busy with worry over all the students from all over the galaxy that that were slowly filling the secluded temple. After all, he had a heavy burden to bear as the first Master of the New Jedi Order._

_Ben walked behind, within the shadow of a living legend. He rubbed his hands on his face in an attempt to dry his tears. Rey made to follow him but stopped in her tracks when he violently turned around._

“W-who’s there?” _He trembled, his eyes blown wide, searching for something he coulnd’t see. Ben doesn’t seem to even sense her though. He self-consciously pulls at a strand of hair at his nape._ “Is it you, _friend_?” _He hesitantly asked the thin air, making the hair on Rey’s nape stand on end._

“No one’s there.” _He whispers to himself, quickly running back towards Luke._

“They didn’t know how else to help you.” Rey gulps, turning around to face present-day Ben. The haunted look in his eyes wasn’t so prominent now that he didn’t have Snoke’s presence in his mind. Instead, ghosts danced in his eyes.

His family was gone now.

He was alone.

Like her.

Rey felt the sudden urge to reach out and take him into her arms, if only to ease the loneliness in him that she felt so acutely mirrored her own when she first felt it back on Ach-To. But she quickly shoved _that_ thought down. The moment passing like a breeze.

“I’m not sure that was their best idea.” He croaks bitterly, not meeting her eyes.

“This wasn’t their fault. Nor was it yours.” Rey cautioned. “How could they have known you…you had been _manipulated_.” She falters, not knowing if the word conveyed the magnitude and severity of what the parasite that had been residing in his mind for most of his life. Festering inside until Ben Solo had been _groomed_ into Kylo Ren.

Ben says nothing at this, his face contorting into an unreadable expression.

“They wanted to bring you home, Ben.” Rey continued, sitting up from her small bed. He flinches at this. “We all did.” She adds softly, nervously watching him turn his head up to face her.

“I can’t go back.” He states, his dark eyes captivating her with the conflict she hadn’t stopped sensing within since that fateful day on Starkiller. When Han and Ben Solo had stared into each other’s eyes for the last time. “There’s nothing there for me to go back to.”

Rey knew he was talking about his family, so she still tried to not take the comment personally. Yet, a small part of her wanted him to come because of her. “You can.” She insisted, sliding down to be on the floor a few feet away from him. “You just don’t want to.”

“Forgive me for not choosing to surrender myself to be executed.” Ben bit out. Rey rolled her eyes. “Without my mother there, that is exactly what will happen.”

“You’d be given a trial.” She huffed indignantly. How dare he think so low of her friends! He didn’t even know them. “I’d talk to Poe and he’d–”

“He’ll what? Let a _war criminal_ walk free?” Ben snorts with a sneer. “Don’t be naive, Rey. I’ll be putting my foot inside the grave if I step anywhere near the Resistance. In fact, the’d probably–”

“I wouldn’t let them.” Rey blurts out. She hadn’t meant for it to sound so desperate, it was just a fact. She owed it to Han and Leia and Luke…and maybe some selfish part of her felt, to herself as well.

“I can’t.” He whispers to her, almost brokenly.

“You’re still choosing this life! How can I help you if–” Rey hissed, hating the way her heart aches yet again as it did before in Snoke’s throne room. But before both of them could continue their endless game of push and pull, a soft knock to her door made her shut her mouth.

“Rey?” Came Rose’s groggy voice from outside, laced with worry. “Are you okay?” She yawns.

Rey quickly stood up and opened the door. “Hi Rose.” She shyly greets the sleep-mussed mechanic, who rubbed her eyes in response. “Yeah, everything’s fine here. I was just…” Trying to convince the enemy to join their ranks? “I’m sorry I woke you up.” Rey drawls out apologetically.

Rose nodded. “You sure? Sounded like you were talking to someone.” She says in between yawns.

“Oh! I sometimes do that.” Rey spluttered nervously, her cheeks burning. “It uh…helped me cope with…Jakku.” She offers, thanking R’iia that Rose is too sleepy to question her explanation.

“Alright then.” Rose nods. “G’night.” She said, waving her goodbye and walking back to her own rooms next to Rey’s.

“Goodnight.” Rey replied, closing the door once more.

They _really_ needed to learn to control the stupid bond.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please forgive me if there are any typos this is unedited but you have all been so kind I just had to post it today! Kudos, comments and shares will forever be the key to my heart <3 see you next Sunday lovelies


	14. Eadu

“You’re distracted.” Kuruk notes from where he’s sitting at the top of some place mats, watching Kylo and Ap’lek spar; chewing noisily on a jogan fruit.

“You’re not helping.” Kylo growled his response, trying to push back Ap’lek’s ferocious attack.

“His mind is on other matters.” Ap’lek quips with a small smirk. “One with hazel eyes and three buns on her head.” At the mention of Rey, Kylo’s ears turn pink. He was thankful his sweaty hair mostly covered them.

“You don’t deny it then?” Kuruk asked annoyingly, still chewing on the damned fruit.

“She doesn’t strike me as the pretty sort.” Ap’lek comments off-handedly, outstretching a hand to the snarling Master of the Knights of Ren, effectively pushing him back.

“That’s because you like your women with _lekkus_.” Kuruk pointed out to the blue Twi’lek, who nodded in agreement.

“Can we stop talking about her?” Kylo snapped, feeling his wooden training ‘saber’ quiver as he tried to pass through Ap’lek’s defenses.

“Why? Does it hinder you from concentrating on your training?” Kuruk is relentless. “His left side is _wide_ open.” He calls to Ap’lek, who hears him before Kylo does and quickly takes advantage of it. Kylo hissed in pain as the wooden training saber came in contact with his unguarded side.

“This is stupid.” Ap’lek huffs. “It’s not fun when you don’t make it a challenge.” He declared, throwing down his wooden saber to the ground. “Stop thinking about the sand rat and fight or go somewhere else to moon over her.”

“The _what_?” Kylo frowns, taking his gloves off with his teeth.

“That’s what Trudgen calls her.” Quipped Kuruk, bouncing off from where he was seated. “Y’know since she comes from a desert planet and–

“Yeah, I get it.” Kylo mumbled under his breath, taking both his and Ap’lek’s wooden sabers to where they stored them.

“What’s so special about her anyway?” Ap’lek asks innocently enough, only half teasing. Of all the Knights, Ap’lek and Kuruk were the only ones who Kylo let in. Marginally anyway.

When he had first joined their ranks, he didn’t like most of them, if any at all. Ap’lek had welcomed him with open arms and even backed him up in his first days of being their Master after he had defeated the original Ren, quickly warming up to the loudand sometimes crass blue Twi’lek.

Kuruk on the other hand was quiet at first. Tall and thin, he was the most solitary of the Knights, preferring to pilot the Night Buzzard instead of being with the rest of them.

The first time Kylo saw him without a helmet he realized why.

He was the youngest of them all, even younger than Kylo by two years or so. His skin was naturally a russet, reddish-brown. His hair was a mess of wavy dark hair that he kept just below his ears like Kylo. He grew a beard that he kept well groomed at all times to appear older.

But what gave him away was his eyes. Theyreminded Kylo of when his mother had told him that one could see what he was thinking just by looking at his eyes.

“She has the Force.” Kylo cleared his throat, avoiding their inquisitive eyes.

Kuruk snorts. “We have the Force. I don’t see you swooning over us.” He teased, hands on his hips.

“I don’t…swoon.” Kylo mutters, scowling at the man.

“Sure you don’t. That’s why you wear that scar like a trophy. Because one _loves_ to be reminded of their failures.” Ap’lek chortled, motioning to his face diagonally where Kylo’s own scar was placed.

“How is it that no one can beat you in battle, but she bested you– twice?” Kuruk nagged on, picking up his disregarded mask from the training room floor. The second time referring to the lie he had told Hux and the rest of the First Order of what had happened in Snoke’s throne room. “Was it really snow you tripped on back at Starkiller or was it your own drool?”

Ap’lek guffawed, clapping Kuruk on his shoulder lightheartedly, both of them walking towards the showers adjacent to the training room. Thankfully, neither of them turned around to notice Kylo’s red face.

*** * ***

Once they emerged fully clothed, Ap’lek and Kuruk paused for a moment to put on their helmets before following him. Kylo had to admit, he did feel quite naked after years of wearing it. And he loathed the fact that he needed to learn to control his expressive face.

Like in moments such as these.

General Hux waited just outside the training room, hands clasped behind his eyes. His icy blue eyes always calculating. “Sir, I have just received a report from intelligence that we have uncovered the location of a Resistance base on Eadu.” The general informed the Supreme Leader, walking behind him and both of his Knights almost briskly.

“What could they possibly want from a planet like Eadu?” Kylo asks him, turning towards the turbolift that led towards his private quarters.

“Sir, the Resistance is hiding out in the old high energy convulsion laboratory where Galen Erso developed the technology used for the first Death Star.” Hux enunciates slowly. “We have reason to believe they might be building a weapon.”

“May I remind you, General, that they hardly have the resources to build a weapon.” Kylo slurred with an eye-roll he couldn’t suppress, pressing the button to go up, but Hux standing in the doorway preventing them to close. “Besides, it mustn’t have been very good technology seeing as it was destroyed. _Twice_.” Kylo pointed out. “I’m far more interested in other pressing matters at hand.” Yet again referring to the fact that Hux’s men hadn’t tracked the damn message from the Sith Eternals.

“Sir, we cannot just ignore the information that has been handed to us.” Hux insisted unflinchingly. “Perhaps this may be nothing, but I would suggest investigating nonetheless.”

Kylo regards him for a moment, knowing all too well that the red-haired general wouldn’t leave him alone until he agreed with him. “Alright, then.” Kylo said, every atom of his being fighting the urge to roll his eyes. “Send word to the rest of the Knights, we will rendezvous at the hangar.”

“Consider it done, sir.” Hux bows his head as he takes his leave.

“I don’t like him.” Kuruk’s modulated voice rings out the second the turbolift’s doors close.“There’s something about him.”

“His face looks very punchable, I must admit.” Ap’lek adds as they make their way upwards.

*** * ***

_“Oh, Ben.” He saw his mother’s face crumple before him. “Just come home.”_

_Then his mother’s face turned into Rey’s. “Ben, we all wanted to bring you home.”_

_Rey’s face morphed into Han Solo’s face. “You know what you have to do, kid.”_

_Han Solo’s face contorted into the mangled, snarling one of Snoke. “Sentiment. How pathetic. There’s nothing left for you there, young Solo.”_

“Master.”

Someone was shaking him awake. Kylo opened his eyes to find Ap’lek’s amber eyes peering intently, one might say even worryingly towards him. “We’ve arrived on Eadu.” The twi’lek informed him, patting him on the shoulder before putting on his helmet. “Bad dream?”

“They always are.” Kylo mutters, rubbing the sleep from his face. Kylo had repeatedly dreamt of this, sometimes it was just Rey. Sometimes it was his parents. And even sometimes Luke Skywalker would show up. The bags under his eyes were getting more pronounced with each passing day cycle.

“This is just a reconnaissance mission,” Kylo told the Knights who surrounded him, awaiting for instructions. “Hux just wants to know what the Resistance is up to. If there are casualties, so be it. But do not attack first.” It wasn’t lost on Kylo how Vicrul’s grip on his scythe blade seemed to tighten at this instruction. “Do you have any objections, Vicrul?”

A beat passed before Vicrul answered him. “None, Master.”

“Move out.” Kylo nods to him, adjusting his hood to cover his head as the hatch of the Night Buzzard slowly opened to reveal the world outside.

Eadu was known to be storm-stricken, the planet shrouded in darkness thanks to its thick clouds and gloomy rainstorms. The ground was uneven and slippery as the Knights of Ren made their way towards the edge of the plateau where they had landed.

Kylo was envious yet again of the helmets the other Knights wore, the cold wind coming in contact with his bare face making his teeth almost chatter.

“The Resistance base is just around that ledge.” Kylo informed them, pointing one gloved finger at the mountainside that connected with the plateau. “We should try and get a vantage point before it starts to rain.” Which could have been at any given moment, if the grey clouds above them rumbled any more.

Kylo couldn’t sense Rey in this planet. He didn’t think the Resistance had many bases. For all the Order knew, they had been severely wounded after the Battle of Crait. But that had been almost a year ago. And if he was honest with himself, he didn’t really pay any attention to what that weasel called Hux said.

A blaster bolt shot just a few meters in front of them stopped his train of thought.

Kylo raised a hand, motioning the Knights that walked behind him to stop. “Kuruk?” He asks quietly into their commlink, so as to not shout and give their location away.

“Scouts.” Answered Kuruk, who was at the end of their little line; always guarding their rear. Being the Knight’s rifleman, his helmet was the only one that was specially adapted with technology to perfect his marksmanship. “Two of them, a Togruta and a young humanoid. They heard our footsteps… I don’t think they can see us.” He whispers back.

“Can you take them out?” Kylo breathes, ears perked up to listen to the sounds of echoing footsteps that neared them.

“Not from here.” Kuruk curses. “They’re about two klicks away from standing face to face with you.” He warns. “Should I–”

“Who goes there?” The young humanoid asks into the night, pointing his glow rod towards where the Knights where standing.

“Gentlemen.” Kylo calls out from the darkness at the two males who were approaching them. “You will let us through.” He outstretched his hand towards them, hoping to influence their minds.

“Identify yourselves!” Kylo could hear the telling sound of the two Resistance members arming their blasters. The Knights of Ren surrounding him inching towards their preferred weapons.

“You will let us through.” Kylo tried once again. Unfortunately mind tricks had never been his strong suit. The Togruta shot towards them, Kylo quickly switching on his cross guard saber to deflect the bolt that was aimed straight to his head.

“You’re…K-Kylo Re-en.” Spluttered the young humanoid when he saw the red hue of the lightsaber that illuminated Kylo’s face and the rest of the Knights standing behind him.

“Will it be the hard way or the easy way?” He asked them, trying if only for the sake of not turning this into a full blown battle to not resort to violence. The men at his sides who were already drawing out their weapons fully begged to differ.

The Togruta man pulled his trigger and Kylo quickly deflected the bolt towards the mountainside. “Think about your odds.” Kylo continued, drawing this out. “There’s seven of us and only two of you.” He comments. The young humanoid, who really looked like a boy, pales at this. His beady eyes wandering towards the masked Knights. “Let us pass and you can walk away from this alive.” He coaxes.

“The Resistance will not be intimidated by you!” The Togruta man snarls, once again raising his blaster.

_Well, I tried._ Kylo thought.

“Get them.” He says, Cardo and Ushar wasting no time in overpowering them.“So uncivilized.”Kylo laments as he walks past them and towards the blinking lights of the Resistance base around the corner of the rocky mountain path.

“You’ve gone soft, Master.” Vicrul comments, walking to match his steps side by side.

“Have I?” Kylo muses, deactivating his saber but not clipping it to his side just yet.

“A year ago you would have slain them on sight.” Vicrul nodded, his mask turning to look at the profe of his master. “Now it seemed as if you were trying to show them…mercy.” He sniffs.

“I take life but I am not wasteful.” Kylo tells him. “They didn’t have anything I wanted.”

“Like the location of where that sand rat is holed up?” Gibed Vicrul. Kylo’s blood went cold at that. There was some truth to his words. Rey was feral, for a lack of a better word. She was ferocious and tenacious and a damn worthy opponent. It was different when it came out of Vicrul than Ap’lek. He truly meant what he called her, like she was an inferior to him.

“My business with the scavenger from Jakku is not your concern.” Kylo replies, warily eyeing the man at his side before picking up his pace to walk ahead, irked by where the conversation was going. He didn’t need anybody knowing about what he and Leia had discussed on Varnak.

Just ahead of them, the old Imperial laboratory that had been turned into a Resistance base was staging blockade of sorts by the gates. “Still think this is just a reconnaissance mission?” Kuruk pipes up cheekily; Kylo could practically hear the smirk that hid behind his mask.

“Just cover our asses.” Kylo orders him, igniting his saber for the second time in a span shorter than ten minutes. Suddenly, a lightning struck behind them and rain began to pour down on them. Much to Kylo’s chagrin, who really _really_ wished he hadn’t smashed his helmet. “Great.” He grumbles.

And then all hell broke loose.

*** * ***

They were all in the mess hall.

It was lunchtime and Boolio had splurged a bit with his choice of food after a decided victory. Deep-fried Nuna legs and redsprout was on the menu, to which Rey was thankful for. She never turned down food; eating clean to the bone and messily licking her fingers clean of grease, while she tried not to choke on her food as she laughed at the story Poe was telling about his days with the New Republic Defense Fleet. A welcome sight considering that now a days he spent more time with Connix, D’Acy and Threepio trying to decipher down from where the message had come from.

“So there I was,” Poe laughs, his eyes crinkling fondly. “running away from a bantha that wanted to mate with me!” Finn almost spat out his drink as he guffawed at the mental image that brought up. “And he was getting up on his hind legs, ready to–“

“Poe!” Connix ran into the mess hall, eyes alert. “We’ve just received a distress signal from the base on Eadu.”

“We have a base on Eadu?” Rose whispers to Rey. To which the latter only shrugged in response, not taking her eyes away from the scene unfolding in front of her.

“The Knights of Ren are engaged in fight,” She informs him, holding out a datapad. “For now they’re holding fort but they don’t know how longer they’ll last.” Poe was about to respond, but Rey beat him to it, quickly grabbing her saber-staff and running out of there and towards the hanger.

“Rey!” Finn called out, running after her with Poe in toe.

“Leave him to me!” She said behind her shoulder as she ran through the hanger’s open doors. “Chewie!” Rey hollers at the wookie who had just been finishing up his Nuna leg, Ro greeting her with a cry from where he was perched atop Artoo’s round head. “Fire up the Falcon!” At which point Chewbacca scarfed down the last of his meal and ran up the ramp to turn on the ship, Artoo beeping excitedly behind him.

“Rey, slow down!” Finn advises, reaching her first.

“We need a plan!” Poe heaves at the same time. “We can’t just run head first!”

“We can.” Rey disagrees, quickly running up the ramp. Poe was beginning to argue but she turned back. “You would have wanted someone to run head first for us in Crait.” She points out, watching how the general’s eyes go wide. “We’re their only hope, we have to help them.”

“Of course, I want to help them.” Poe retaliates.

“Then do it!” Rey beseeches. “You don’t need a master plan to help. You just have to be there. And with every minute that passes we’re losing time.” She tells him, outstretching her hand. “You can come with me or I’ll meet you there, but I’m going. So mark that as my second strike.”

“You know what you are?” Poe huffs, hands on his hips. “You’re difficult.” Rey blinks at him. Not knowing if he meant it as an insult or compliment. “We’ll meet you there.” He says, nodding at her and running down the ramp towards the locker rooms to put on his flight gear. “I’ll tell Connix to send you the coordinates!”

With a final smile to Finn, Rey ran towards the cockpit where Chewie had everything set up for their trip. She nodded towards him, piloting the Falcon out of the hanger; not even waiting for Control to give them the go-ahead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hiii lovelies!! How are you? I hope you like this one!! As ALWAYS thank you so much for your support and thank u to my beautiful Beta who's an absolute SUN of a human being<3 Kudos, comments and shares are eternally appreciated :)


	15. The final saber duel

The jump to Eadu was relatively a short one. Rey was putting on her rain poncho she stored from her time on Ahch-To when Artoo beeped a question at her.

“No you can’t come, you’ll get wet.” Rey tells the Astromech droid, who squealed his argument. “I know you’d be _very_ helpful, but your wheels will get stuck in the mud,” She points out. “Then you’ll get cranky.”Artoo makes a sound of indignation even if he agreed with her, ultimately staying behind with Ro.

Chewie was already waiting for her on the hatch, his goggles firmly placed to shield his eyes from the rain with his bowcaster armed and ready. She nods to him and he clicks a button, the cold wet rainstorm greeting them as the ramp descended in front of them.

“Keep the ship prepped in case we have to make a run for it Artoo!” Rey calls behind her shoulder, the droid letting out a shrill beep in response. Even from where they had landed a few ways behind the base, they could smell the soot mixing with the rain. She sensed his presence nearby.

Everywhere Ben Solo went, chaos ensued.

Rey could hear the whispers and mumbles of her fellow Resistance members who parted out of her way towards the frontlines where Poe was standing next to Finn and a tall woman with curly hair and skin the color of rich mahogany. “Madame Jedi.” The woman greeted her, Rey could hardly call herself a real Jedi but then remembered what Bo-Katan Kryze had said. To this woman and the entire galaxy, Rey was the last Jedi.

“Rey, this is Jannah.” Poe introduced her, his hands raising a pair of night goggles to his eyes. “She’s in charge of the deserters.”

“Deserters?” Rey questions, eyes blown wide turning to look at Finn who looked at her sheepishly. She’d thought Finn had been the only one to escape the clutches of the First Order.

“I was TZ-1719. Stormtrooper.” Jannah explained. “All of us here have defected from the Order.” Well that explained some of the tech Rey noticed to be clearly from the First Order, including Jannah’s own bow made out of blaster parts and her armband containing a transponder. Not to mention the bunch of TIE-Fighters parked through the compound. “None of it could have been possible without the help of Finn.” She continues. “Glad to finally meet you, Madame Jedi.”

“It’s just Rey.” Rey mutters, squinting her eyes to try and get a better look at the Knights of Ren; the rain and the pitch black darkness making it near impossible.

“What are they waiting for?” Poe grumbles annoyed, dropping the goggles from his eyes.

“Dunno,” Jannah shrugged, but her face belying her worry. “They pulled back the minute _Rey_ made planet-fall.”

Then it dawned on her. “He’s waiting for me.” Rey says, looking at Poe who knows exactly of who she’s talking about.

“Rey, I don’t think this is a good idea–” Finn starts to object.

“You can’t protect me forever.” Rey interrupted him gently. “If you send anyone else they’ll die, you know it.” She insists, looking at Poe. “I can distract them and give you a fighting chance to get evacuate the base.”

“Why is it always _you_ who distracts him?” Finn grumbles in annoyance.

Poe contemplated the situation at hand, eyes trained on the darkness ahead of them. He slowly nodded. “Chewie and Jannah will stay with you while Finn and I get everyone into the transports.” And Poe being Poe whistled to get everyone’s attention. “Alright, everyone who has a ship, evacuate immediately! Whoever doesn’t follow me!” He orders, waiting for people to start moving.

Finn clasps her shoulder affectionately. “We’ll be back as soon as we can.” He promises, she nods. “Stay safe, please.” He tells her, before running to join the others. It would seem everybody wanted to keep her safe.

They’d forgotten she survived 14 years alone on Jakku. She could hold her own.

She turned to the darkness and walked right in, the sound of thunder and rain no match to her rapidly beating heart that pounded in her ears. The crack of a lightsaber igniting echoed despite the raging storm. A red hue illuminated Kylo’s bare face where he stood a few meters away from her, his Knights surrounding him in a crescent moon.

“What, no mask?” She calls out to him, saber staff poised diagonally in front of her. His Knights looked like something out of a nightmare, their hellish masks making them difficult to read. She sensed they were all Force-sensitive, some more so than others. But none of them compared to the raw strength and energy she felt radiating from him; the Bond humming and the Force dizzying from the intensity it flowed amongst them.

“Why are we always fighting, Rey?” He asks her honestly, his eyes infinitely sad. “I’ve already told you that the Sith Eternal are planning something. Something involving _you_.” Kylo continued, his voice harsh.“Don’t you get it? Whatever it is, we need to figure it out and stop them. Together.”

“Together? You’re not with me.” Rey seethes, all of her hurt bubbling to the surface like a volcanic eruption at the sight of him in the flesh and not projected through the bond. All she had ever wanted was for somebody to _want_ her. To choose her. “You made that very clear aboard the Supremacy.”

Kylo’s mouth curled up in a snarl. His chest heaving with uncontrolled anger. “I offered you _everything_ I had!” He exploded. “I killed Snoke for you, for hurting _you_!” Kylo fumed. This much she knew was true. He had endured years of what she had suffered for only a few minutes. The numbing white-hot pain of Snoke splintering your mind to find what he wanted.

“I never wanted any of it!” Rey snapped. “The galaxy, the power, I– I just wanted you!” She admitted brokenly. Finally.

He stared at her in awe. A moment passing between them where the sheer weight of what she had said loomed in the air. “Then, please.” He says a pleading undertone to his voice, holding out his gloved hand once more. “I’m not your enemy.” Kylo croaked, walking towards her slowly.

“Ben,” Rey warns, her emotions too overpowering for her to control them. “I can’t.” She didn’t realize the hot, primal rage and the darkness that began to cloud her judgement. And that was all the warning he got before she lashed out, igniting her white saber-staff as fast as a viper.

He’s shocked for a moment before he regains his footing. Kylo had no choice but to attack in kind if only in self-defense, the beams of their lightsabers crossing. The resulting burst of energy bathing them as lightning struck behind them. He shoves her lightsaber off with a loud grunt. The Knights behind him are poised to strike, their weapons raised. Kylo merely lifts his free hand, effectively pushing them back with the Force.

This fight was theirs.

They circled each other cautiously like animals, waiting for the other to attack first. To wage war between them. The bond seemed to hum in delight at their close proximity. Something akin to rightness and a feeling of home washed over them. Which fueled Rey’s fury.Her chest heaved in anger, rage and hurt of knowing that they both wished the same thing yet neither willing to set aside their differences to be together.

It was time for play to end.

Kylo was physically stronger, that much was apparent from their other encounters. But she was a little bit faster. With a snarl, Rey pounced. Launching herself at him again. Blow after blow, their lightsabers clashed. True equals like they had always been, even on Starkiller when the Force within her had just awakened.

For a while she drove him backwards, but he pushed through, pressing his blade down. Tug and pull. The fight continued to shift their power dynamics. Neither of them could get the upper hand. They had been inside each other’s heads, the bond feeding them their knowledge to each other.

Kylo barely keeps up with an enraged Rey that kept swinging wildly at him. He’s not actually fighting her though. _He’s holding back_ , Rey senses. Red saber crossed with white. Their faces mere inches from each other, shards of light illuminated them. The hissing of rain evaporating as it fell to their blades and their heavy breathing was the only sound around them.

“Rey, enough!” He yells through the rain. “Let. Go.” Kylo now begs, his eyes staring intently at her. “Stop fighting it.”

_Stop fighting me,_ he sent the thought through the Bond as clear as day. Rey stumbled on her footing. It was the first time he had done that.

In her heart, she felt the Dark Side pulling gently to her. Beckoning her. Rey was dancing perilously close to the point of no return. To the point Rey was sure her parents had fought to save her from.

_Kill him,_ a voice inside her head said, urging her forward. It sounded eerily familiar. Like a voice she had heard before. She would have done so, if not for the looming figure behind him.

“Ben, duck!” Rey yells on instinct.

For the instant he did so, her blade came in contact with the one of a masked Knight who was about to stab Ben in the back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter huh? However it's crucial to moving along the story!! I hope you're still liking it!! Many thanks to you all!!! Kudos, shares and comments are forever appreciated <3


	16. The Betrayal

“What are you doing?!” Kylo bellowed to Vicrul, pure unadulterated rage twists his features.

“You are no Knight of Ren.” Vicrul snarls at him, his scythe locking with one end of Rey’s saber before he suddenly headbutts her. The sickening crack of his helmet coming in contact with her skull is followed by a yelp of pain from Rey as she is knocked down to the wet ground like a rag doll. Vicrul has his scythe raised above his head to strike her down.

All Kylo can see is red.

His instinct to protect Rey was overwhelming. As an animalistic growl escaped his lips,he closed the distance between them and met Vicrul’s weapon with his own. “I see how it is.” Vicrul seethes, venom lacing his every word at the sight of his master protecting the one who was supposed to be their enemy.

Kylo rested an unconscious Rey across his body, her bleeding head atop his left shoulder and his left arm holding fiercely across her middle; with his right arm outstretched in warning– saber pointed towards the treacherous Knight.

“Do you see with who his alliance truly lies?” Vicrul yells, addressing the other Knights. “You’re weak.” He spits in his direction.

“This is treason.” Boomed Ap’lek, clutching his vibro-ax furiously.

“Come on, Rey.” Kylo whispers furiously at the limp woman in his arms. “I could _really_ use some help here.” She moved her lips in response but no words come out, her eyelids twitching but not opening.

“You stand with him?” Vicrul asks the Twi’lek, an ultimatum and a warning.

“Always.” Ap’lek responds in a heartbeat, swiveling to stand next to Kylo who was still kneeling on the ground with Rey.

“It will be your downfall.” Vicrul swore threateningly, before attacking him.

Kylo yanks himself and Rey away from the fight, placing her on the ground as he sees Ushar raise his own weapon. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. His own Knights were betraying him. Trudgen and Cardo didn’t seem to make up their minds whose side they were on, he would take no chances.

Either they stood with him or they would die by his blade.

*** * ***

Rey couldn’t see.

The blunt force of the Knight’s helmet had knocked her out cold for a split second. She could hear shouts all around her. In the background, Rey thinks she could make out Chewie’s growl screaming of her name. She holds her bleeding head tightly as the light trickles back, her eyes focusing once again.

Someone was fighting, very near her. Rey could barely make out the figures in front of her. Kylo was fighting his Knights. They had turned against him. With her sight almost returned fully, she stands up on wobbly legs. Her vision is still blurry, but it’s enough. Rey shakes her head gently for clarity– he needed her help.

With a grunt, she raises her lightsaber and ignites it, the double-blades humming to life. All heads turning towards her, using their initial surprise to her advantage, she rushes in to be at Kylo’s back. Guarding his blind spot, one of the Knights wedging himself in between their shoulder blades.

“Glad you could join the party.” Kylo strains as he fights one of the Knights.

“Sorry I’m late.” Rey snaps, teeth bared at the Knight in front of her who was raising his vibrocleaver to attack her. “Who’s this?” She asked of the Knight who seemed to be fighting with them, rather than against them.

“I’m Ap’lek.” The person introduced himself, his vibro-ax blocking the attack of yet another Knight. They all looked the same in her eyes. “You must be the sand rat.”

“The _what_?!” Rey protested indignantly, her blade locking on with the Knight in front of her.

“You know,” Kylo quips as he pushes Vicrul off of him. “Now’s not the time for introductions!” One of the Knights shoots the one Rey had been fighting with on the shoulder. A warning shot, she realizes. He didn’t want to kill the other Knight. The Knight she had been fighting with turned to the one who had shot him, clutching his shoulder in pain.

“Cardo.” The one who had been shot whispered.

Cardo –the one who shot first– raised his arm cannon in warning. But he would not be able to shoot, as the Knight with a war club lowered his weapon and took out a vibromachete from an inverted sheath in his torso. He charged, a choked gasp escaping Rey’s lips as the Knight plunged the blade straight into the other man’s back; the blade jutting out of his chest. Cardo’s arms slacking limply at his side as the blade pierced his heart.

“No!” The man who had been shot cried out in a different kind of agony.

At the same time Kylo yelled: “Cardo!”

Out of nowhere, a blaster bolt was shot directly towards the man who had impaled Cardo, so strong it effectively sent him flying backwards. Rey couldn’t see who had shot, but she sensed he was an ally…for now at least.

Rey suddenly felt an extreme pain, like her insides had been ripped open, reaching blindly down to her side she felt no wound. Then the realization dawned on her.

It hadn’t been Rey who was hurt.

The man who had started the attack– the one with the scythe blade, had seen the opportunity and thrusted his blade into Kylo’s side.

“Ben!” Rey roared, swinging her lightsaber. Cutting the Knight’s arm that held the scythe clean off. The smell of burnt flesh permeated the air as the Knight in question howled in pain, clutching the stump where his forearm had been just a second ago tightly to his chest.

“Vicrul!” The Knight who had been blasted off his feet yelled. “The Night Buzzard!” Whatever that meant, _Vicrul_ seemed to understand. With one final snarl he ran into the night, the other Knight following close behind him.

But Rey wasn’t going to let them go so easily.

Blood pounded in her ears and her heart was beating so hard it might break out of her ribcage. The sheer hatred she felt for the men was unmatched to anything she had felt in her life. They had betrayed Ben, had tried to kill him. Had hurt her. Rey opened her mouth in a scream, her right hand extending towards them.

Raw power burst out of her fingertips.

Blue lightning danced in her hands, a pure Force energy fueled by all the rage and hatred she felt within. It was brighter than any sun she had ever encountered. Rey willed it towards the retreating traitors. She could hear their screams of agony as they fell to the ground, twitching and recoiling not unlike how it felt to touch live wire on the Star Destroyer graveyard back on Jakku. Rey could smell their burning flesh even from where she stood; could sense their muscles tensing and clenching because of the electricity coursing through their bodies.

_They should die, they deserve it._

These were not her thoughts. Rey stumbled back, gasping for air and shaking her head. She reeled in the Force lightning instantly, her stomach dropped in horror.

What had she done? 

She could barely see the two men scramble towards their ship. Rey’s hands trembled when she turned off her lightsaber, feeling woozy as she knelt besides Ben who had slumped downward, his eyelids fluttering while he tried to stay conscious. He was loosing too much blood.

“Ben.” She breathed, not knowing if what was trailing her cheeks was the rain from the storm that continued to rage on or her own tears. She wasn’t a doctor but Rey knew his wound was mortal. He was holding on by a thread. His eyes slowly fluttered shut and Rey panicked.

_Help me,_ she pleaded to the Force.

In the back of her mind, Rey felt _something_ guide her hand. But she couldn’t concentrate on _what_ it was exactly. She placed her hand on top of his gaping wound. Rey closed her eyes, brow furrowed in concentration. The air filled with a resonant hum. She could sense _everything_ on Eadu.

_Life._

_Death and decay, that feeds new life._

Rey drew from everything around her. She willed all of her healing energy in to him. The sound of her quiet sobs muted by the crack of lightning above her.

Rey realized, she was _terrified_ at the thought of loosing him.

She fixed all of the broken tissue, starting from the organ that had been damaged and working her way up through the layers that made up the fabric of his skin. Rey continued to work tirelessly, willing his body to mend itself. Feeling muscles, sinew, and skin reconnect once again like it was her own body. Rey was transferring her own life Force into him, knitting his entire body closed; leaving everything in her wake smooth and perfect.

_Please don’t leave me._ The errant thought ran across her mind. _How could I_ _live without you?_

And when Rey felt his heartbeat stabilize, she slumped forward with a gasp. Her head on his chest, her own labored breathing making her chest heave unstably; their heartbeats in sync.

He was whole now. He was safe and alive.

“Rey!” She heard Finn yell in the distance.

The sound of someone’s footsteps made her look up weakly. A black-clad Knight was looming above her. But he wouldn’t hurt them, she sensed. It was the one who fired. The unknown shooter all this time had been a sniper, hiding high on the mountain’s face. She could sense Finn and the rest of her friends were coming closer.

“Trudgen.” Ap’lek whispered softly to the Knight who wailed in pain, still clutching Cardo’s lifeless body a few feet away from them.

“Leave me.” Trudgen said in between a sob and a growl.

“Rey!” Poe barked followed by the howl of Chewbacca calling out her name, their voices were getting closer by the second. She knew what she had to do.

Rey looked up to the Knight who had knelt in front of her; even in her weakened state, she felt his trepidation towards her because of the sheer display of Force power he had just witnessed.

“Take him.” Rey croaked, knowing all too well what would happen to him if the Resistance got to them first. “Please.” She begs. The Knight nodded slowly.

Rey nods back, not sensing any ill-will from him. She looked down at Ben’s unconscious body. He was alive, so very weak and fragile but alive all the same. She could feel him still in her heart, that was all that mattered. She raised her hand to stroke his cheek, reveling in the softness and warmth she finds underneath it.

Rey closed her eyes, lowering her lips to place a gentle kiss to his forehead.

“Come home, Ben Solo.” Rey whispers weakly against his skin.And with her final wave of strength, rolled over to her side.

The Knight of Ren quickly got to work on hauling Kylo’s body up before the Resistance could get to them. “Ap’lek!” He cries out to the other Knight, who rushes to his side. Amongst both of them, they each slung one of Kylo’s arms over their shoulders, his head slumped forward.

“There’s a village…” Rey croaked, hoping to the maker they had heard her. “Not far from here…go there…keep him safe…” But Rey didn’t know if they had. For darkness enveloped her senses yet again. Transferring her life force onto him had weakened her substantially. She would do it again without question.

Rey would have given him all of she had to, even if she died trying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi aaaall it's been a hectic week but I think I'm back in full force! Thank you so much to my wonderful Beta for being amazing and so patient and supportive <3 Anyways as always, thank you so much for the support!! I'm glad to hear that y'all are liking it so far :)) Kudos, comments and shares are forever appreciated... See u next Sunday lovelies<3


	17. A fall from grace

“Rey!”

“Easy.” Kuruk drawled, hands on Kylo’s chest pushing him slowly back onto the cot he was laying in.

“Where’s Rey?” Kylo croaked, his throat scratchy. Where were they? The ship wasn’t the Night Buzzard, it was old and dingy and smelled of an animal he couldn’t quite name. He seemed to be lying in the cargo hold within the rusty bowels of whatever heap of junk they were currently in.

“She’s safe. Trust me.” Kuruk assures him. “I’m going to lift your head up, okay?” Earning a weak nod from Kylo. Kuruk’s gloved hand held his sweaty head up and forward, taking a canteen full of water to his lips, the water cool on his dry throat. He gulped greedily until Kuruk pried the canteen gently away from his mouth.

“Vicrul.” Kylo growled as Kuruk laid his head back again, he felt so weak from the wound inflicted on him by the treacherous Knight.

“Him and Ushar took the Night Buzzard.” Kuruk explained with a hard look.

“Trudgen?” Kylo asks, but Kuruk merely shook his head in response. He had been aware that Cardo and Trudgen were partners. He’d first noticed it when he joined the Knights. They always shared meals and supplies amongst them, they fought together side by side and mended each-other’s wounds in almost reverence. It was hard not to notice once they took off their masks, they only had eyes for each other.

He could only imagine what it felt like. To have the one person you cared for more than yourself ripped away from you–…he didn’t _want_ to imagine.

“He betrayed me.” Kylo snarls, brow furrowed in anger. Vicrul had tried to kill him and he had wounded Rey. He was going to kill him the moment he saw him.

“He betrayed us all.” Ap’lek snaps as he enters the cargo hold, leaning on the wall with his hands crossed in front of his broad chest. “Must’ve had a reason too.” He sniffs. “You don’t betray family.” Kylo knew what this meant to Ap’lek. Before he became a Knight, his family had sold him to slavers when there was a big drought in his village. Ap’lek killed his master so he and the other slaves could be free.

“Where are we going?” Kylo asked them, carefully sitting up; his aching bones protesting all the way.

“Coruscant.” Kuruk answered, taking out a nutrition bar and handing it to Kylo. “Hux is waiting for us at the Citadel.”

He sensed that something was bothering Kuruk, he couldn’t actually read his thoughts as he had taught all of the Knights to shield their minds. “Out with it.” Kylo sighed.

Kuruk hesitated, sharing a glance with Ap’lek before speaking: “After Vicrul wounded you, the scavenger –Rey,” He corrected himself. “She…I didn’t even know it was possible.” He trailed off, looking both amazed and terrified at whatever Rey had done. But he shook his head. “We’ll arrive there in about five hours.” Kuruk deflected.

“What did she do?” Kylo asked him warily.

“Lightning.” Ap’lek answered after Kuruk had remained mum, seemingly at a loss for words. “She produced lightning from her fingertips.”

Kylo’s eyes widened. He had known that Rey was powerful with the Force. But the skill was unbelievably rare. Snoke had used it against him occasionally but it wasn’t common and Luke Skywalker had been the subject of Palpatine’s madness aboard the Death Star. From what he had read, it was only conjured through the dark side of the Force. Produced by feelings of anger and hatred.

“That…” Kylo trailed off. “That’s a dark side ability.”

“She used it on Vicrul and Ushar. But didn’t finish them off.” Kuruk said with a sigh, standing up fully and walking out of the cargo hold. “Not so dark side.”

“You should rest.” Ap’lek advises, turning to follow Kuruk out.

“Whose ship is this?” Kylo he sniffs disdainfully, unable to control himself.

“We bought it off some nerf herders on Eadu.” Ap’lek answered offhandedly. “That’s why it smells like shit.” He chuckled to himself. Kylo watched him go to the cockpit. He laid down yet again, his mind racing. Force lightning was essentially a Sith power. So it worried him to no end that perhaps Palpatine was already attempting to get a hold of Rey. He needed to speak with her, to see that she was alright and safe. To make her understand that they should all be very afraid of what was to come.

He drifted into a dreamless sleep before he could try to activate the Force Bond.

*** * ***

By the time he woke up, they are orbiting the planet. Coruscant’s thousand blinking lights greeting them. The entire planet was one big city and Kylo had a few memories here from when his mother used to take him with her on diplomatic trips.

He’d never liked Galactic City much, preferring Chandrila’s Hanna City’s rolling hills to Coruscant’s towering skyscrapers. Besides, it was polluted, loud and had that smell that you could only describe as a lot of people living in too close proximity with one another.

“This is Control. Identify yourselves.” A modulated voice came from the commlink channel.

“Control, this is _Kuruk Ren_.” Kuruk clears his throat. “We have on board Supreme Leader Kylo Ren. Requesting permission to dock at the Citadel.” A beat of silence passed.

“Permission granted.” The voice stated. “Transferring security pass to dock in launch bay 81.”

“Something feels…off.” Ap’lek muttered as Kuruk piloted the rickety ship towards the hanger where they would land. “I don’t like this.” Kylo had to agree with him, there was an energy buzzing in the air. They didn’t need to have the Force to feel the tension.

The three Knights stopped in front of the hatch, not activating the ramp to lower just yet.

“We are with you all the way, Master.” Kuruk tells Kylo, his modulated voice still conveying the sincerity in his words as he gave him a solemn nod. On that note, Ap’lek punched the button and the entrance ramp lowered to reveal a squad of a dozen Stormtroopers waiting for them.

And none other than Grand Admiral Rae Sloane was standing in front of them.

Kylo of course had known about the woman who was legendary among the First Order officials. She had dedicated her life to serve the Galactic Empire and was instrumental in its survival. People often speculated that she had been the one to birth the First Order, but all Kylo knew of the mysterious woman was that she had practically indoctrinated Hux since his infancy. Snoke had even proclaimed her Protector of Eriadu shortly before the events on Starkiller Base. But Kylo had never seen her before in the flesh.

She looked just like the holos.

The mysterious Grand Admiral still wore her Imperial Uniform, the almost blinding white contrasting with her dark umber complexion; the First Order’s insignia on her left shoulder, almost out of view. Her black, coily hair was secured in a sleek low ponytail, streaks of grey hair displayed her age proudly but her almost wrinkle-less skin could have fooled anyone.

“Supreme Leader.” Sloane welcomed, hands clasped tightly behind her back. Not moving an inch from where she was standing pin-straight as the trio walked towards her. “Forgive me, we have not met before. I am Grand Admiral Rae Sloane.” She extended one hand out for him to shake, which Kylo did; her grip firm before dropping.

“Forgive our appearance Grand Admiral,” Kylo apologized, knowing that they all probably reeked of sweat and nerf shit. “We have had a rough night.”

“I see.” She pursed her lips. “If you shall follow me, I’ll escort you to General Hux. He was most eager to greet you upon your return, Supreme Leader.” Sloane nodded, turning quickly and walking towards the end of the launch bay; the Stormtroopers waiting until the Knights had passed before walking behind them.

Something was off indeed.

The Citadel was an ancient building. It had once housed the Jedi Order as their primary temple for centuries during the Republic Era, then it had been the Emperor’s seat of power during the days of the Empire and now, it bore the First Order’s flags of red and black. No sign of the old Jedi Order could be traced within the walls that housed paintings and sculptures of the old Empire, its walls sleek and edges sharp. It was not to be a welcoming sight at all.

Grand Admiral Sloan led them towards the raised dais at the center of the main foyer Kylo knew to be a turbo lift. The four of them and a handful of Stormtroopers stepped aboard it, the lift activating with the movement.

One. Two. Three floors passed and still they hadn’t gotten off.

They were probably being led to the High Council’s tower, the Emperor had resided there in his time. Kylo had steered away from there after the Siege of Coruscant. Hadn’t even explored much of it since he was constantly shuffled from meeting to meeting. And any free time he had was spent in the training room.

“This way.” Sloane clipped when she stepped inside at the topmost floor, not even sparing the Knights a glance, who had no choice but to follow her. Two guards posted on each side of the grand double doors nodded in acknowledgement at the Grand Admiral and pushed the doors open.

Where General Hux was sitting atop the throne; on either side of him, Vicrul and Ushar stood proudly. The entire High Command stood around them, their eyes hard and unforgiving. “I had hoped you would be dead by now, Ren.” Hux sneered, a smirk playing on his face at the thought.

“No, I am very much alive as you can see.” Kylo scoffed, raising a single brow defiantly. His eyes found Vicrul who had unbeknownst to him, seemed to have lost a limb aside from being almost fried alive by lightning. His cybernetic hand gripping his scythe firmly.

Kylo had no doubt that it had been Rey’s doing. He’d have to congratulate her the next time he saw her. That is _if_ he saw her again.

“Kylo Ren.” Hux stood up, clasping his hands behind his back not unlike the Grand Admiral did. “You are here accused of the murder of Supreme Leader Snoke, plotting with the enemy known as Rey of Jakku and committing high treason against the First Order.” He announced, nose pinching up as he recited the information. “Do you accept these charges?”

“On what grounds?” Kylo said, the muscle below his left eye twitching in both nervousness and irritation, his fingers inching to take hold of the lightsaber clipped by his side. But he was outnumbered. And no matter how many times Han Solo tried to teach him that it was best to die trying than to have never tried at all, Kylo wasn’t looking particularly too keen on feeling blaster fire on him without a fight.

From his pocket, Hux procured a small holo where the image of him and Rey was being projected. They were in the elevator that led upwards to the throne room aboard The Supremacy.

_‘You will not bow before Snoke.’ Rey from the holo-vid said._ He had never noticed how she seemed to glance at his lips once she stepped closer to him.

_‘You’ll turn. I’ll help you. I saw it.’ Rey whispered._

_‘I saw something too.’_ How odd it was to hear himself whisper back to her. _‘Because of what I saw…I know that when the moment comes you’ll be the one to turn. You’ll stand with me.’_ He too had glanced down at her lips. _‘Rey, I-‘_

“Enough.” Hux sniffed, turning the holo off and shoving it down his coat pocket. “You cannot deny the truth.” He snapped his fingers, suddenly a Stormtrooper pushed Kylo down on his knees. “Your master is a traitor.” Hux addressed Ap’lek and Kuruk who had also been forced to kneel down. “Do you pledge yourself loyal to the First Order?”

“My loyalty lies with the _Knights of Ren_.” Ap’Lek spat, rage palpable even if his voice was being obstructed by the modulator of his helmet. “I am loyal to _Kylo Ren_. In this life and the next.”

“Pity.” Hux lamented, turning to Kuruk who had not uttered a word. “And you? To whom are you loyal to?”

Kuruk grimaced, his eyes averted. “The First Order.” He mutters, shoving the Stormtroopers off of him, dusting himself off as he stood up.

“A wise choice.” Hux remarked. “I hereby sentence you both to death.” He announced, pure satisfaction on his face; he walked towards them and leaning in front of Kylo. “I plan to make it the greatest execution this galaxy has ever seen, Ren.” Hux snarled with a menacing grin, before he stood up and walked away. “Take them away!” He ordered, sitting down once again on the throne.

“Hux, you slimy bastard! You know what’s coming!” Kylo yells as he is cuffed and dragged by the arms out of the throne room.

“Yes,” Hux smirks, picking off imaginary lint on his uniform. A habit that made Kylo’s blood boil. “Whatever the so called Sith Eternals are planning will be dealt with swiftly and efficiently. In any case, you’ll be dead long before then.”

Kylo bared his teeth like a rabid dog. And Ap’lek continued to yell at the people in the room. “Kuruk! You spineless rat! I’ll kill you for this! You and Vicrul and Ushar! I shall dance and spit and piss on your grave. Then I’ll–

“Will someone shut the Twi’lek up?” Hux complained, massaging his temples, the double doors closing at this. Kylo heard the thud of the butt of a trooper’s blaster coming in contact with Ap’lek’s nape, his body going limp a moment after.

Kylo remained in absolute silence afterwards as they were both dragged down, deeper into the Citadel and into the dungeons. Where they threw him roughly into a too bright cell. They unclasped his lightsaber from his belt and placed a collar around his neck before they took his cuffs off, the collar in question humming with electricity. One wrong move and he’d be shocked for sure.

“Not so tough now, huh.” The trooper chuckled mirthlessly, swinging the cell door closed. And then the cell was pitch black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy belated Valentines Day lovers!! So sorry for not posting yesterday, my laptop went AWOL because I forgot it inside my sister's backpack lol. I sincerely apologize! I hope u like the chapter <3 Kudos, shares and comments are forever appreciated!


	18. Stay Alive

Kylo didn’t know how long he had been in that damn cell.

They had long stripped him of his clothes, given him a hose down which in his opinion made him smell even worse and gave him simple dark blue linen clothing. The windowless cell remained dark all day, he couldn’t even tell time.

The only interaction he had with the outside world was when meals appeared twice a day, but even that seemed to be a deliberate attempt to throw him on a loop because they would never appear in the same order. It could have been days, weeks or even months for him really.

He slept a lot and it was a mercy not to dream.

In the bad dreams, he could see himself stabbing his father through chest, his blade a terrible red or Snoke forcing himself into his mind. He dreamt of Luke killing him that night in his hut or seeing his mother die differently every time, yethe was always unable to save her. Sometimes, he saw the vision from Mustafar. He woke up with cold sweat dripping down his temples when he had those types of dreams; Palpatine’s words echoing in his ears afterwards.

But then those dreams faded away and Kylo dreamt of a green planet that reminded him of Naboo. The hills of tall grass and warm sunshine made him feel at home, oddly at peace. He’d hear laughter all around him and could vaguely make out a small form in the distance that seemed to run towards him with outstretched arms. Kylo dreamed of Rey as well: her smile, her laugh and other not all too respectable things he wanted to know about her. These were good dreams.

The sound of the door opening woke him up quickly, for he had always been a light sleeper. He didn’t bother turning his head to the small sliver of light, they’d probably just throw the veg meat and energy bar on the ground and call it a day.

“Get up.” The trooper whispered harshly. Kylo had no intention to move, he had been having a particularly good dream which involved him kissing Rey all the way down–

“I said get up.” The trooper repeated, closing the door behind him. Kylo couldn’t see the soldier, but he felt his fingers dig deep into his neck as he pulled him up by his collar.

“What are you–”

With a single click of a button, the collar fell to the ground with a loud clank.

The Force surged into him like a flood, filling him with strength. Kylo had never noticed that the collar had been tempering with his connection to the Force. Suddenly, he felt Coruscant’s dizzying Force signatures rushing back to him.

“They’re called Ysalamir collars. New tech.” The Stormtrooper explained. “Named after the tree dwelling lizard of Myrkr, legendary for its ability to repel the Force. Quite ingenious actually.”

“Kuruk?” Kylo asks the trooper incredulously, noting his accent and inability to shut up.

“In the flesh.” Kuruk quips, taking his helmet off.

“Is the war over?” Kylo blurts quizzically, he had like a dozen questions he wanted to ask.

“It’s only been a week.” Kuruk scoffs, rolling his eyes at Kylo’s usual dramatic behavior. “Alright ‘nough talking. We have to get you out of here.”

“What?” Kylo says, perplexed at the man who had betrayed him.

“This was always the plan, you moron.” Kuruk huffs, putting his helmet on once again.

“But Ap’lek he–”

“He was the one who came up with it.” Kuruk explained grabbing Kylo by the arm and leading him towards the cell door. “Should’ve become an actor. He would’ve been great in a soap opera!” He chuckles, raising a single finger to his lips, signaling Kylo to be quiet as he put on his helmet once more. With a push the door opened a sliver, the harsh light making Kylo squint his eyes in response. “Come _on_.” Kuruk yanks him out of the cell and into the brightly lit cell block.

Kuruk didn’t waste any time for him to adjust before he dragged him out of there.

“So what’s the plan?” Kylo huffed, blinking a few times before comfortably opening his eyes to see they were running out of the dungeon.

“I’ve secured you a TIE, the coordinates are already punched in. You just need to turn it on and it’ll get you where you need to go.” Kuruk explains, walking briskly with his blaster at the ready. “I’ve been told that the First Order has decoded the message from the Sith Eternals. It came from a planet called _Moraband_. But–

“Hey!” A voice from behind them calls out.

_Kriff._ They were so dead.

“What are you doing with the prisoner?” Another stormtrooper was running towards them.

“Supreme Leader Hux wants to see him before his execution tomorrow.” Kylo was always amazed at how Kuruk could talk his way out of anything. His skills could really rival those of Han Solo. Kylo could also admit that he was thankful he was being rescued on the eve of his execution.

Maybe he did have some Solo luck in him.

“I haven’t been informed of that order.” The Stormtrooper thought out loud, before shaking his head and raising his blaster. “Identify yourself trooper. I’ll have to clear it.”

“Identify myself?! I am commander of this cell block!” Kuruk gasped, feigning outrage at the thought.

“How dare you!” The other stormtrooper barked. “I am Commander GT-727! Identify yourself at once trooper!” Seven hells. They were in big trouble now. GT-727 quickly grabbed his blaster, aiming it at them. Kuruk was faster and shot first, the commander sent flying away.

“Commander?” The fallen trooper’s commlink buzzed on the ground. “What’s going on?”

Kuruk ran towards it and grabbed it with shaky hands. “Just a slight blaster malfunction, everything’s alright down here. We–we’re all fine here. Thank you.” He splutters.

“We’re sending a squad down there.” The person on the other end of the comm informed.

“Uh negative! Negative. We’re all right down here! H-how are you?” Kuruk rattled on, Kylo wincing as bent down to grab the commander’s blaster.

“Who is this? Identify–”

Kuruk threw the comm to the other side of the corridor. “Come on!” He says urgently, yanking Kylo again towards where they had been initially heading.

“This is some rescue.” Kylo mused, breathing heavily while they ran down the corridor.

“Next time, I’ll just let you be executed!” Kuruk snaps at him. “How ‘bout that?” Before Kylo could quip his reply, they rounded a corner. Coming face to face with a whole squadron of stormtroopers.

“Hey!” One of the trooper yells,both Knights moving in sync as they open fire on them.

“You– don’t…happen to have my lightsaber with you by any chance?” Kylo grunts as they hold their own.

“It’s in the TIE!” Kuruk booms, shifting his blaster rifle to rapid firing; smoke rapidly filling the corridor.

“It sure would’ve been helpful if I had it with me!” Kylo hissed.

“One more complaint and I’ll leave you here, your highness!” Kuruk warns, gritting his teeth. When the smoke cleared and they were the only ones left standing, Kuruk was the first to react. “They’ll send more!” He calls out, Kylo quickly running behind him to catch up.

“So plan still on?” Kylo heaves.

“New plan.” Kuruk bites. “Stay alive.”

“I like that plan.” Kylo agrees as he followed Kuruk down the narrow corridor. What they were attempting was insane. Much like a lot of his life had been since that damn message was broadcasted.

In a single week, he had been betrayed, almost killed and now, he was being rescued one day before he was to be executed. Silently, Kylo dared to hope that they would get out of this somehow. If Dameron and FN-2187 could do it aboard a Star Destroyer of all places, they could do it too. Only this wasn’t a Star Destroyer. This was the First Order’s seat of power.

They approached a door, Kuruk trotted towards it and punching a number into the keypad. “What about the security cameras?” Kylo suddenly thought, looking around the corridor.

“I remembered to rig them. Don’t worry I had help.” Kuruk laughs mirthlessly. “Which reminds me, here.” Kylo was quick to catch at whatever Kuruk had thrown his way. He was shocked to see it was his mother’s ring, the blue stones shining.

“Where did you get this?” Kylo asked him breathlessly, pocketing it. He thought he had hidden it somewhere no one would find it but him.

“You’re not as slick as you think, _your royalness_.” And with a punch, the door slid open to a landing pad where a single Special Forces TIE fighter lay waiting, the sounds of the booming Coruscanti night life erupting in their ears. Both of them made a run for it, the minute they stepped onto the platform the shrill of an alarm scared them half to death.

“Keep running!” Kuruk yelled. Stormtroopers were beginning to flood into the open hangar. “Don’t look back!” Kylo did was he was instructed, not turning back even when he heard blasters being fired, quickly ducking his head.

Miraculously, they reached the TIE and Kylo quickly climbed up, turning around to reach out to pull Kuruk up. “Kuruk! Come on!” Kylo hollers.

“Someone has to cover for you!” Kuruk heaves, shifting his blaster rifle to fire plasma bolt at the incoming troopers. “Go! Start the engines and initiate autopilot when you’re in orbit,” Kuruk instructed. Kylo blinked a scowl quickly forming on his face as he yet again tries to pull Kuruk to safety. He was his friend, he wouldn’t leave him. “I’ll be fine! Just go!” Kuruk snarls as he slaps his hand away.

“May the Force be with you.” Kylo gulped, quickly clambering up the TIE.

The interior of the Special Forces was different than that of his Silencer, it was spotless and smelled brand new. Kylo had to wonder what Kuruk had sacrificed to get it. He examined the controls laid out before him. Some where familiar while others weren’t, he’d have to work around the ones he didn’t recognize.

“Stay calm, stay calm.” Kylo mutters to himself, turning on the damn thing while sounds of blaster fire rung in his ears from the fight outside.

Working on the semi-familiar controls, he finally got the ship to start; the deafening roar of the ion engines coming to life making him wince. He still had to fly it. As he pulled the ship up and out of the hanger, Kylo could have sworn Kuruk had jumped off the ledge of the landing pad and into the courtyard bellow. But he was out of the Citadel hangar before he could get a better look. He wasn’t about to wait around to get some company.

He had spoken too soon it would seem.

As the rest of the Citadel was alerted of his prison escape, five TIE’s appeared out of another hangar. They quickly gained up on him. Kylo muttered a colorful curse, piloting the TIE in a sudden nose dive and into the Coruscanti traffic. Beeps, horns and assorted explicit words in multiple languages were directed towards him as he disrupted the somewhat hectic traffic. Kylo couldn’t care less. He was getting out of Galactic City or die trying. Hux had no doubt ordered them to shoot him out of the sky seeing how trigger happy the TIE’s in pursuit were.

He swerved to avoid the various ships that crossed his path as he quickly pulls up once more and zig-zags through the lanes. To onlookers, he probably looked like a crazy First Order pilot gone rogue. An almost hysterical laugh escapes his lips as he swerved a skyscraper and quickly pulled up, escaping the traffic and rapidly exiting the planet’s orbit.

Whoever those pilots who had been sent were, they were no match for Han Solo’s son.

The TIE fighter rocked crazily from the g-forces when he raised the ship into a full on vertical ascent and strait out of the atmo. But he wasn’t safe yet. Kylo quickly punched the button Kuruk had instructed.

“Autopilot sequence, initiated.” The robotic voice of the ship’s control states. He had no warning before the TIE zoomed itself into a hyperlane. With a shaky sigh, Kylo allows himself to breath at the absurdity of the situation. Letting the hum of hyperspace gently calm his rapidly beating heart.

If the TIE hadn’t been so small, Kylo was sure he would have thrown up by now.

*** * ***

Two figures stood in awed silence, staring at the sight in front of them.

“He escaped.” Grand Admiral Sloane noted the obvious bitterly. Her gaze fixated at the space on the horizon where the TIE fighter carrying Kylo Ren had just disappeared. “It appears your men are starting to form the habit of committing high treason.”

General– _Supreme Leader Armitage Hux_ hated to admit the defeat on his first official command. He had actually planned tomorrow’s execution to be broadcasted on the HoloNet. Hux was determined to make it as humiliating as possible for Ren. And then he would have the grandest coronation the galaxy had ever seen. But now, the insufferable man had escaped in one of the First Order’s own ships.

“I’ll leave you to it, _Supreme Leader_.” Sloane turned around on her heels and walked out the room without another word.

She walked through the darkened halls of the Citadel, shadows dancing on her face as she passed the large windows that let in the light from the city; not much had changed since the days Sloane had spent here in the glory days of the Empire. When she reached her private quarters on the west side of the Citadel, shemade a beeline to a door, opening to a special area within her quarters.

No one had access to this place but her. She punched in the codes and a hologram appeared in the dark.

General Pryde, an older man with arrogant blue eyes and a high hairline appeared. It took effort and careful planning to erase all records of these meetings, but the risk was worth it. She believed that wholeheartedly.

“The heir of Alderaan has escaped his capture.” She informed him tartly, her lips pursed in contempt. “He might have gone anywhere in the galaxy.”

General Pryde let out a sigh of frustration. “Has your boy done _anything_ right in his life?” He referred to Hux who Sloane had all but raised. She didn’t let the insult get to her. There were more important things than defending Armitage’s pride. Men were rabid curs who rose to anger with easy bait, women were serpents who waited for the right moment to strike.“The Emperor grows impatient of waiting, Grand Admiral. Perhaps the galaxy needs reminding who their rightful ruler is?”

Sloane nodded in agreement. “Send a ship somewhere. Perhaps to a settlement that interests both sides?” Her heart skipped at the mere thought of it. “Maybe Batuu or Chandrila?” She proposed.

Pryde grinned at this, his smile twisting his weathered face. “The scavenger girl resided in Jakku did she not? The High Priest has had a vision from our Emperor and he is most curious to find more about what makes _her_ …tick.”

Sloane smirked at the thought of it. “Indeed.” She hums. “Let it burn. The fruit of our labor must be known. And our Emperor’s final order must be heeded.” The colossal Sith fleet was their life’s work, it would be hidden no more.

The image sputtered. The transmission was weak and fragile, having made the impossible journey from the Unknown Regions and anomalous space. But it was enough. “I shall give the order.” Pryde drawled, seemingly yearning to do so. All they had worked for their entire lives was finally coming to fruition. Everything was proceeding as their Master had foreseen.

Sloane smiled and with a click, ending the transmission.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi hoooo guys!! I'm always shook and awed by your response to this lil fic!! I truly love and appreciate each and every one of u!!! Until next Sunday lovelies <3 (Many thanks to my beautiful beta as well, she's the backbone of this operation lol) Kudos, comments and shares are always appreciated


	19. Unexpected Predicament

Rey was in the medical wing for a full week. Her friends had taken the duty to entertain her for all of it.

Chewbacca informed her how he had to carry her limp body back to the Falcon from where they found her lying there in the rain, her head bleeding from the impact of Vicrul’s blow. And once he started recalling past adventures with Han Solo and Master Skywalker, nobody could stop him. Of course, not many people understood what the Wookie was saying.

Most of them, looked at the scene confusedly as it seemed Rey clung to every word –or growl really– that came out of the furry creature’s mouth; Ro the porg sitting comfortably on her lap.

Rose always appeared bright and early, a freshly potted plant in hand. Rey didn’t know how to properly thank Rose at the small but significant gesture, especially when she patiently taught Rey how to water and take care of them. But Rose didn’t bat an eye, adjusting the pillows beneath Rey’s head.

“Us Tico’s love to take care of people. Especially our friends.” Rose had confessed, a bittersweet smile adorning her lovely face. And she’d talk on and on about her sister Paige. And Rey, would listen.

R2-D2 tried and failed to arrive without C-3PO. Both droids loved to chatter and constantly fought to get Rey’s attention. But she never turned away their company, especially when they helped her continue to decipher the ancient Jedi texts.

BB-8 always came by after dinner time and sometimes Poe came with him, who apologized profusely for not being able to be there as much. To which Rey always replied that he had an entire Resistance to lead so he was exempt from entertaining duties. That didn’t stop both of them from trying though. BB-8 and Poe were an endless well of stories about adventures ranging from their days at the New Republic Defense Fleet to a time when BB-8 shot casino chips at a drunk alien on Canto Bight. And Poe often brought her news of how Connix was doing with the message decoding.

The one constant throughout the week was Finn.

He tried to remain by her side as much as he could. They talked about everything. How life was like as a Stormtrooper for Finn and how she grew up alone on Jakku. And when she was getting antsy from being cooped up for so long, Finn convinced Doctor Kalonia to let her go outside to watch the first rain of the season.

That’s where they were now.

Sitting at the edge of the hangar, watching the rain drop from above and onto the green lush planet. Rey liked it when it rained. Especially here on Ajan Kloss. Back on Ahch-To where she had first encountered rain, it had been grey; the roar of the ocean drowning out the soft pitter-patter. On Eadu it had been a violent storm, rain dropping hard like pebbles on her skin. Here, the rain rolled and fell gently from the sky, making the jungle appear even more alive in front of her eyes. Rain was destruction and chaos, yet it also brought life and new beginnings.

“Do you know why I rarely fight anymore?” Finn speaks up suddenly, breaking the comfortable silence they had been sitting with. Rey turned to look at his profile. “The first time I fought for the Resistance on Crait, I was willing to lay down my life for the cause until Rose stopped me.” He chuckles at the memory, eyes still trained on the falling rain but his mind was elsewhere. “What use would I have been to the Resistance if I had died?” Finn turned to look at her then. “The Resistance doesn’t need more soldiers. The lines are filling up, slowly but surely. People are starting to walk away from the First Order. Troopers, technicians, engineers– even some high ranking officials like majors and captains.”

“That’s great.” Rey smiles at him, remembering what Jannah had said on the base of Eadu. She couldn’t imagine the hardship many —if not most, of the people who escaped the First Order had endured under Snoke’s reign of terror.

“I found where I’m needed Rey,” Finn smiled earnestly. “These people –especially the troopers– need rehabilitation.” Finn gulps, looking away in sadness. “We were taken as kids. All we were taught was to kill the enemy. More machines than people. And I…I don’t want that for them. Everybody’s worthy of a second chance. I want them to fight if they believe in us or live peacefully if they don’t.” He gulps. “Jannah helps of course, she’s been on board since she contacted us–” Rey was excited for Finn. “I got a bit derailed from what I wanted to say,” Finn cleared his throat nervously. So Rey flashed him what she hoped was an encouraging smile.

“Not all of us are meant to fight, Rey.” He offers. Rey frowns at this. “You’re the last Jedi. I’m sure there are more people like you out there and you’re the only one who can– y’know teach people to move stuff with their minds and lift rocks… So, maybe… You shouldn’t fight anymore.”

Rey ponders this for a moment. She knew what he meant of course. And it made sense. Even if she didn’t like it. All Rey had ever known was to fight. For survival, for her life. Who was she if she didn’t fight? Sometimes she didn’t know what she was capable of doing to protect herself and her friends.

But teaching?

The only teachers she had ever had was herself and Luke Skywalker, the latter not being so skilled at it. Would Finn think she was teacher material if she knew about her dark vision? Or that she had produced lightning from her fingertips? Rey had been putting off telling him. For fear of what he would think of her.

Finn seemed to be waiting for her to respond and she almost did; until the sound of an explosion derailed her train of thought. Immediately, the hanger began to fill up with people. A small group being led by Poe and Snap walking out into the jungle from where smoke was leaving a trail in the sky.

“Poe? What’s happened?” Finn asks the aforementioned pilot who walked by, completely oblivious to him.

The sound of a hoot, distracted Rey from the commotion. She turned around to find a single bird perched atop a light on the doorway to the hangar. It wasn’t just any bird. It was the bird from her dream. Rey’s feet moved on their own accordance, walking closer to the bird; its green intelligent eyes peering down on her just like in her dream.

“What are you doing here?” She whispered to it, reaching out on her tippy-toes with her hand extended towards it.

“Rey!” Finn calls out, effectively shocking her as she turned to her friend. Because where he was standing, Poe, Snap and the other’s held a man harshly by his throat and arms; blasters pointed towards him as they all but dragged him across the hangar.

Rey frowned as she turned back to the bird, only to find that it was gone. She shook her head as she walked over towards Finn. But Rey froze, dead in her tracks when she finally saw the face of the man who was soaking wet from the rain outside.

“Ben?”

*** * ***

“What the hell is he doing here?!” Finn snarls towards Poe.

They were all crammed inside a room within the holding cells of the base. Rey didn’t even know they had a jail, then again she hadn’t really explored the base, too caught up in the beauty of the jungle outside of it. The room they were in was divided by a glass wall, on one side the Resistance intelligence and on the other Ben Solo was sitting down with his back straight and his hands clasped in front of him on a table. If he sensed her, he didn’t show it. His eyes were trained at his hands.

“Finn, I don’t know!” Poe exclaimed, hands on his hips. “We’ve been communicating with people within the Order. One of our informants claimed he would be arriving today.” He exclaimed.

“And you think Kylo Ren is the spy?” Finn scoffs, crossing his arms on his chest.

Rey leaned towards Rose, who was staring next to her. “We have spies?” She asked Rose in a hushed whisper, but the small woman shrugged in response.

“No,” Poe shakes his head. “He seemed just as surprised to see me after he crash landed.”

“He’s not answering his comm, sir.” D’Acy piped up from where she was trying to communicate with the informant. “Should I try again?”

“Keep trying.” Poe sighs, running a hand through his hair.

“Maybe the First Order found out who he was working with.” Connix offers nervously, chewing the nail on her pinky finger.

“They’d be over our heads in an instant if they had.” Poe waved her off, eyes turning towards the man on the other side of the glass wall.

“ _Spectre here_.” The commlink buzzed suddenly, D’Acy handing it over to Poe.

“Rising moons?” Poe asks cryptically.

“ _Bright suns_.” Spectre answered without hesitation.

“Spectre, can you tell me why the hell do we have _Kylo Ren_ in our cell block?!” Poe barks, making everyone in the room wince.

“ _Would you have agreed to take him in if I had?_ ” Came the crackled response of the informant. Poe says nothing at this. “ _He is where he needs to be. He has information that might be of use to you. I must go. I’ll contact you soon. Spectre out._ ”

“Can I talk to him?” Rey asks. All eyes turn to her.

“Rey,” Poe started. “Let me talk to him first.”

Rey snorts. “And you think he’s going to answer to you?”

“She has a point.” Rose comments from where she’s sitting down. “He always seems to be…interested in her.” She offers with a weird look on her face.

“Poe, he’s a murderer!” Finn argues, face hot with anger. “I can’t even believe we haven’t executed him.” Rey rolled her eyes when Poe began to argue that Spectre was right— they had the former Supreme Leader in their midsts they were going to milk every last bit of information he had.

Rey reached for the medpac before shouldering her way out of there. Ignoring Poe and Finn’s heated argument. The guards posted in front of the cell door know better than to question a Force-sensitive, quickly opening the door for her.

“Alright, Dameron.” Ben huffs, not looking up from where his head is dropped on his hands. “Let’s make this quick.”

Rey clears her throat awkwardly. “Sorry to disappoint.”

A small gasp escapes her lips when he whips his head around to look at her. His narrow face and the intensity of his gaze had always been the subject of her thoughts after she’d first seen it. Even more often once their Force Bond had been formed.

Only it wasn’t the sight of it alone that made her react in such a way, it was the fact that the scar that bisected his face was no longer there.

“You changed your hair.” He blurts out as if he couldn’t stop himself, eyes scanning over her hair, her face, her neck. Rey self-consciously brought a hand up to touch the Alderaanian mourning braid she had added to her half-up hairstyle.

She was sure he recognized it from the look he gave her.

“You changed your face.” She retorts, placing the medpac on the table and zipping it open.

“Something tells me that was _your_ doing.” Ben commented, watching her intently as she took out an irrigation bulb and a gauze. “A shame really.” He laments.

“I-I’m going to touch you,” Rey blushes and she doesn’t know if it’s from the thought of actually putting her hands on his face or the fact that he did think it was a shame he lost the scar she had given him. “Is that alright?” She asks him softly.

He nodded, moving his chair to face her and so she nodded back. Reaching out, Rey gingerly touched his jaw to make him look up at her. She tried not to fixate on the utter warmth radiating off of him when she brought the irrigating bulb up to his temple where he was bleeding lightly. Ben winced as Rey let the small drops of cleansing fluid seep into his wound, lightly pressing the gauze shortly afterwards.

She’d thought about this. Touching his face.

Of course, Rey hadn’t thought it would be when he had just crash landed mere klicks away from a Resistance base. Rey hoped he didn’t notice that the furious blush that warmed the apples of her cheeks hadn’t gone away.

“Am I going to live, Doc?” He queries, an unfamiliar but welcome glint in his eye and an odd quirk to the right corner of his mouth made Rey feel like it could be considered a smile adorning his full lips; his expression softening slightly.

“Unfortunately.” She deadpanned with adramatic sigh, drying his temple off with another gauze. He looked like he wanted to say something, but the sound of the door opening disrupted their little cease-fire.

“Dameron.” Ben nodded at Poe, looking at him enter the holding cell from the ‘mirror’s’ reflection.

“Rey, could you give us a minute?” Poe gives her a tight smile that was too wry to look genuine while she collected the medpac.

“She stays.” Ben enunciated slowly, a muscle ticking below his eye and his hands clenching into fists. Rey could sense that he was irked by the idea of being left with Poe alone, but at the same time he was nervous. Of what they would do if she wasn’t there to vouch for him.

Just like she had been aboard the Supremacy, he was alone without her.

“You’re in no position to order us around.” Poe hissed angrily, his jaw clenched so tightly Rey though he was going to burst a blood vessel. One didn’t need to have the Force to feel the palpable tension within the cramped jail space. There was a…history there between the two men in the room.

“If she doesn’t stay,” Ben warned, his eyes flashing mischievously. “I don’t talk.” He shrugged pettily, crossing his arms over his chest.

“And why’s that?” Poe all but snarls, his face turning an alarming shade of red.

This time, Ben turned to her. His dark eyes unreadable and his mind shielded from her probe of his side of the Bond. What was he playing at? Was he going to out her to the single most powerful person in the Resistance? Even if it was a treasonous act, their Bond was the most intimate connection Rey had ever had. She had barely told Leia.

But the moment passes; his demeanor once more as if he was still in control of the situation. “See, that question sets me up to talk.” Ben snorts nonchalantly, knowing full well he wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

Poe paused for a few heartbeats before he nodded. Then without a warning took out the blaster from his holster and pointed directly towards Ben’s forehead. Rey’s eyes widened, but Ben merely smirked. Arrogant bastard. “Will you talk now?” Poe seethed.

“Poe,” Rey warned, her hand taking hold of his outstretched forearm. “Calm down.” Without taking his eyes off of Ben, he took a deep breath and lowered the weapon. Instead of placing it once more on its holster, he left it on top of the table. As both a warning and a reminder as to who actually had the upper hand here.

“She can stay.” Poe conceded with a huff.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi y'all!! College has been kicking my butt lately so forgive me if these updates are posted in a wonky schedule :) See you next week!! As always many thanks to my wonderful and ever so patient beta and all of you for following this story along!! Many love & light to u all!!!
> 
> Kudos, shares, comments are always appreciated <3


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